Category: Articles

The Case for Asylum in These Less Than United States

Tom Dispatch
By Liz Theoharis
April 19, 2026

In late March, I sat in the gallery of the Supreme Court for the first time in my life. Throughout my 30 years of grassroots anti-poverty work, I’ve joined countless protests and vigils outside the Court. In 2018, I was even arrested and held in detention for praying on its palatial steps. Now, I was seated with a clear view of the nine justices of the nation’s highest court. I was there as a guest of immigrant rights lawyers, as their team made oral arguments in Noem v. Al Otro Lado, the most significant case on the right to asylum in decades.

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Can the Young Wrest This Nation from the Clutches of Full-Throated Authoritarianism?

Tom Dispatch
By Liz Theoharis and Sam Theoharis
February 3, 2026

Here’s a small suggestion from the two authors of this piece (us): don’t be young in Donald Trump’s America if you can help it. Being young in America right now means you’ll have to contend with stalling job markets, rampant inflation, deep political and economic instability, and impending climate disaster. If you point these things out, you’re labeled a dangerous (and misguided) radical. If you’re too busy trying to make ends meet for you and your family, you get labeled as lazy, apathetic, and defeatist.

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The (Immoral) Politics of Authoritarianism and the Bible (Then and Now)

Tom Dispatch
By Liz Theoharis
December 11, 2025

As more of the Epstein files are released, reminding us of Donald Trump’s close association with Jeffrey Epstein and the young people he abused and trafficked, as well as the president’s ongoing array of misogynist insults and actions (like calling journalist Catherine Lucey “piggy” and name-calling Marjorie Taylor Greene to the point where she jumped ship), what keeps coming to my mind are the sexual exploits of authoritarians throughout history. As a scholar of the New Testament and the origins of Christianity, I have a special interest in the lives of the Roman emperors — in particular, the notorious Emperor Nero.

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Theological Abominations in Trump’s America

Tom Dispatch
By Liz Theoharis
September 9, 2025

It was a moment somewhat like this, 30 years ago, that turned me into a biblical scholar. In the lead-up to the passage of the 1996 Welfare Reform Act, political and religious leaders quoted scripture to justify shutting down food programs and kicking mothers and their babies off public assistance. Those leaders, many of them self-described Christians, chose to ignore the majority of passages in the Bible that preached “good news” to the poor and promised freedom to those captive to injustice and oppression.

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Liturgies of liberation offer “a shared moral vision for a better world.”

Faith & Leadership
By Liz Theoharis & Charon Hribar
July 22, 2025

In a world consumed by political polarization, economic crises and rising violence, there is a growing hunger for spiritual practices that do not retreat from reality but help us face it with courage, clarity and collective action. In this moment, the resurgence of ritual, prayer and cultural arts within social movements offers more than comfort and belonging; it provides strategy, sustenance and a shared moral vision for a better world.

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The Struggle to Thrive and Not Just Barely Survive in Trump’s America

Tom Dispatch

By Liz Theoharis and Noam Sandweiss-Back

July 20, 2025

Most days, in the heart of Pennsylvania’s Bible Belt, the old sanctuary at Christ Lutheran Church sits empty. Decades ago, it was home to a congregation of 3,000 people. By the late 1990s, that number had dwindled to seven. At the turn of the millennium, Jody Silliker, a young minister fresh out of seminary, was sent to shutter the downtown church, a mile from the state legislature in Harrisburg.

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And What It Means in the Age of Trump

Tom Dispatch
By Aaron Scott, Liz Theoharis and Moses Hernandez McGavin
June 3, 2025

This year, Pride Month arrives at an especially dire moment for the LGBTQ+ community. Under the second Trump administration, homophobic vitriol and violence are on the rise. On Elon Musk’s X platform, a “deepfake” video of Donald Trump canceling Pride Month has gone viral.

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Anti-poverty activism has provided a model for transformational power, based on four strategic principles

The Guardian
by Rev Dr Liz Theoharis and Noam Sandweiss-Back
June 1, 2025

For tens of millions of people, Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” is a grotesque nightmare. The proposed legislative cuts, including historic attacks on Medicaid and Snap, come at a time when 60% of Americans already cannot make ends meet.

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The Power of the Poor in Trump’s America

Tom Dispatch
by Liz Theoharis and Noam Sandweiss-Back
April 15, 2025

The day after Donald Trump won the 2024 election, the 10 richest people in the world — including nine Americans — expanded their wealth by nearly $64 billion, the greatest single-day increase in recorded history. Since then, an unholy marriage of billionaire investors, tech bros, Christian nationalists, and, of course, Donald Trump has staged an oligarchic assault on our democracy.

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A Battle of Theologies in the Age of Trump

Tom Dispatch
By Liz Theoharis
March 2, 2025

“There has almost always been an outright hostility that is shown towards people of the Christian faith,” House Speaker Mike Johnson said on a podcast recently. He was talking with Tony Perkins, a former Louisiana lawmaker and president of the Family Research Council, about freedom of religion and the actions of the second Trump administration.

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