The chief of a legal team that fights on behalf of churches and church rights has delivered a warning about a California legal scheme that could be used to set up church properties for confiscation through eminent domain.
That’s the procedure that allows governments to take private property for the public good, usually for projects such as roads.
It is Brad Dacus, of Pacific Justice Institute, who explained on the “Washington Watch with Tony Perkins” about the process being assembled, according to the Washington Stand.
It started with concerns about affordable housing when, in 2023, California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat with known hopes for higher office, signed into law a plan letting “religious institutions and nonprofit colleges … bypass local zoning laws in order to quickly establish affordable housing.”
The idea was accommodating growth with housing services, including for low-income and homeless populations.
At least 10 churches could have land taken for public housing in California. “The law allows [developers] to… seek eminent domain against churches,” explains @PacificJustice President Brad Dacus. https://t.co/FDychp5zJP
— Tony Perkins (@tperkins) October 5, 2026
The report said, “But now, churches in the deep blue state are finding that property developers are attempting to use the regulations to force them to sell property against their will, which could eventually devolve into their property being confiscated through eminent domain,” the Washington Stand confirmed
“California has this mandate that cities have to appropriate zoned land so you can have government-paid public housing projects for the homeless. [The city of] Lakewood went ahead and decided to [do this]. And our attorney Natalie Smith appeared and made it very clear that this is very objectionable because they said, ‘Okay, all these 10 churches, we’re going to zone them. They could be churches, but we’re going to zone it also to be used for public housing.’ Now, they didn’t use eminent domain and say, ‘We’re going to use eminent domain ourselves.’ They just said, ‘We’re going to zone this for public housing,’” Dacus said.
The threat is that a developer could go to court and complain a city was not meeting “requirements” for public housing, “so we are going to do it.”
“And the law allows them to file independent actions and be able to seek eminent domain against churches. Is it hypothetical? No. Right now, we are in Huntington Beach, California [in] Orange County defending a church at Calvary Chapel that is dealing with that issue. A developer [is] trying to take part of the land rights of a church right there in Huntington Beach under the same auspices … to say we need more housing,” he said.
Perkins said, “We’ve seen this before. One of the reasons they’re going after churches is they don’t pay property tax. They’re not getting money from those churches. They would rather turn that into property that’s generating tax revenue, so that’s one of the reasons these churches get targeted.”
There also was the concern that, with control of the property under a threat, a lender could decline to work with religious organizations on church projects.
“That’s a very real possibility as well.” Dacus said.
