More than two weeks have passed since an impromptu march across the Roebling Suspension Bridge between Cincinnati, Ohio, and Covington, Kentucky, devolved into utter chaos. Scenes of protesters tased, beaten and wrestled to the ground by local law enforcement during arrests marked a gruesome end to an otherwise peaceful night advocating for the release of a beloved local faith leader and imam who was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
“I thought people were going to die that day,” said Tala Ali, a chairperson of the Clifton Mosque in Cincinnati and a trained protest marshal. She told Salon that Covington police refused to talk to her when she attempted to communicate with them about dispersing the crowd. She also claimed they jammed a less-lethal weapon that resembled a rifle into her back as she marshaled people back toward Cincinnati.
The July 17 march and the police activity that followed reflected the rising tensions of an Ohio Valley community in turmoil following the arrest and detention of Imam Ayman Soliman, a 51-year-old former chaplain for Cincinnati Children’s Hospital, arrested and detained by ICE on July 9. In many ways, Soliman’s detention and the termination of his asylum status were the straw that broke the camel’s back for residents of Cincinnati, which Ali said has seen both an increase in ICE sightings and immigrants with legal status suddenly facing the threat of detention and deportation since President Donald Trump took office.
And it is, in part, because of that strain that the police response that night hasn’t deterred the community from continuing to fight for their — and Soliman’s — rights.
“The community actually is doing what a community is supposed to do,” Ali said. “We’re holding each other close. There are debrief and healing circles, and care for each other. We know that what happened is part of a larger pattern of assault and violations of human and civil rights that is being perpetrated by authorities and always has been, historically.”
The demonstration began after protesters participating in a sanctioned vigil calling for Soliman’s release nearby were invited to march across the bridge that night in a spontaneous action meant to evoke the march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama, during the Civil Rights Movement some 60 years ago.
That police activity so quickly turned to violence as the demonstrators crossed into Kentucky came as a shock. Tensions were high from the start, with organizers surrounding and trying to block a black SUV as it inched across the bridge toward marchers. At the halfway point, Covington police shouted dispersal orders that protesters said they couldn’t hear clearly over the chanting. Shortly after police told marchers to move onto the bridge’s pedestrian walkways, they began making arrests.
Video of the encounter shows police escalating their approach, firing nonlethal projectiles and deploying tasers. One clip shows an officer approaching a man and punching him repeatedly near the head before getting him on the ground and handcuffing him. Police made more than a dozen arrests, including of two local reporters.
“The violence that was initiated by the Covington police was a direct reflection of the violence that is being forced upon communities through these continuing immigration raids, and the imam is a public face of it,” argued Rev. Nelson Pierce Jr., senior pastor of Beloved Community Church in Cincinnati, who was there on July 17.
“The feeling that is evoked by those videos and pictures … is playing day in and day out in our communities,” he added.
Pierce Jr. told Salon that he believes the Covington police deployed force to prove a point — either about the protest or about Cincinnati’s community-centered approach to policing.
“There were people in that group of police officers that first showed up that seemed intent, if not excited, to beat people up,” he said.
The Covington Police Department did not respond to a request for comment.
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At a press conference held the day after the incident, Covington Chief of Police Brian Valenti presented a series of clips from social media posts and body cam footage to show more perspectives of the incident. The officer who repeatedly punched a man before arresting him explained in a use-of-force report read during the news conference that he first thought the man may be reaching for a potential firearm in a pouch around his waist and delivered the blows to prevent them from falling from the bridge as the man held onto it. That officer was placed on paid administrative duty pending an investigation into his use of force.
Still, the videos circulated on social media did not show the full story of what police encountered on the bridge, Valenti said.
“The reality of it is, we always try to use arrest as a last resort,” Valenti said. “We try to give everybody ample opportunity to get along, do what they need to do, but in this case, there was a group that did not.”
In the weeks since the protest, Pierce Jr. said, the activist community has been trying to regroup, process and figure out how to move forward. Of the 15 protesters who Covington police charged with felony rioting and misdemeanor failure to disperse, only four retained the serious charges; some pleaded guilty to the misdemeanors in exchange for dropping the felonies, according to WVXU News.
But the police response hasn’t slowed anyone down. In fact, it seems to have galvanized the community more around advocating for Soliman. A community member told Ali that they’re organizing a letter-writing party for Soliman, while Cleveland residents have reached out to offer to house people who need to travel to the northern Ohio city for immigration proceedings. Amid the groundswell of people calling to request visits or check on his well-being, local organizers are also planning actions on Soliman’s behalf for the week of Aug. 10.
All of that is also happening against a backdrop of Cincinnati Children’s Hospital, Soliman’s former employer, firing two employees who spoke out about Soliman’s detention and asylum status termination.
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Just days after the July 17 protest, the hospital fired former interfaith chaplains Elizabeth Diop and Adam Allen for violating the company’s policy by participating in a media interview without authorization and creating posts on social media. In a letter to staff days after their terminations, obtained by Salon, hospital CEO Steve Davis warned the staff that speaking out could violate policy, suggesting that doing so could be characterized as political, given the current climate. Diop and Allen told Salon they had no regrets.
“It has definitely empowered people,” Ali said, also admonishing the hospital for refusing to address Soliman publicly.
Soliman remains in ICE custody at the Butler County Jail in Ohio after the Cleveland Immigration Court determined it did not have the authority to grant him bond. He will appear before the immigration court on Aug. 12 over the issue of reestablishing his asylum status. Last week, a federal judge granted him a temporary restraining order preventing his removal out of the immigration court’s jurisdiction until at least Aug. 13.
Meanwhile, the faith leader has also filed suit in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Ohio to challenge the termination of his asylum status as arbitrary, capricious and a violation of federal law, namely the Administrative Procedure Act, the Fifth Amendment and the Immigration and Nationality Act. That suit also seeks a restraining order on the Department of Homeland Security’s mandate on Soliman’s detention in an effort to secure his release, his lawyers said.
“We want to create as little distraction as possible from what is happening to Ayman, while we are caring, while we are recovering, and while we are coming together as a community, and addressing this because it needs to be addressed, and not forgetting the story,” Ali said.
