Ayman Soliman walked the line of supporters gathered along a gray, brick wall in Cincinnati, Ohio‘s Clifton Mosque, stopping to shake each person’s hand. Just moments later, he stepped behind the podium in the center of the room to address his audience.
“It is just as our Christian friends call it, a rebirth. I am reborn today. I was reborn at 12 p.m. today,” the imam and former interfaith chaplain said.
In his first time addressing the public directly since his release from Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention Friday afternoon, Soliman thanked his friends, his fellow clergy and the surrounding community for their efforts to advocate for his freedom. He wouldn’t be here without their efforts — and his faith — he said, and he is indebted to all of them.
“I’m free today because of this advocacy and Islam,” Soliman said. “My faith, our Prophet Muhammad said, ‘You can’t be thankful to God until you are thankful to people first.'”
Soliman was released from the Butler County Jail in Ohio early Friday afternoon, after 72 days spent in ICE custody. He was detained on July 9 during a routine check-in with the agency following the termination of his asylum status a month prior.
Robert Ratliff, a lawyer for Soliman, told Salon that the legal team received notice around 11 a.m. Eastern time Friday that U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services planned to rescind the termination notice and reinstate Soliman’s asylum. Nearly an hour later, he received notice from counsel for the Department of Homeland Security, which filed a motion to terminate Soliman’s removal proceedings around the same time. Ratliff said the government did not provide any reason for its decisions.
“I think it was more a culmination of problems in this case, which goes to our point, which was this was always a stretch from the beginning, and it just reeked of somebody targeting him,” Ratliff said in an interview.
A beloved member of his local community, in part, because of his work as an interfaith chaplain at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital, Soliman’s detention sparked public outcry in the tri-state area, with residents holding vigils and spreading the word, fellow clergy writing open letters, including one they hand-delivered to Republican Gov. Mike DeWine’s office earlier this month, and advocates raising funds and leading rallies to demand his release. One such protest across the Roebling Bridge ended in chaos after Covington, Ky., police deployed force against demonstrators, resulting in the injury and arrest of more than a dozen people, including two reporters.
A video posted by local activist group Young United Souls for Revolutionary Action Friday afternoon shows the imam exiting the Butler County jail, carrying a trash bag with what seemed to be his personal belongings, and being greeted by friends and community members who awaited his release. Ratliff said the imam traveled to the Clifton Mosque shortly thereafter to attend the Friday prayer.
Rev. Elizabeth Diop, one of two Cincinnati Children’s Hospital chaplains who lost their jobs for speaking publicly about Soliman, waited outside the mosque to welcome her former colleague back. Their reunion, she told Salon over text, was a much bigger relief than she’d expected.
“I was so scared. I didn’t realize how scared until I got word he has been released.”
“Everyone is so overwhelmed with gratitude to God for sure,” she said, noting that she couldn’t stop crying. “I was so scared. I didn’t realize how scared until I got word he had been released.”
The imam was “praising God and expressing gratitude to those who love him and worked with God toward his release,” she added.
Soliman received notice in June that USCIS was moving forward with revoking his asylum status, which he was granted in 2018, alleging that he had provided material support for a Tier III terrorist organization during his time in Egypt. Over the course of his two months in detention, DHS counsel leveled several allegations of Soliman’s participation in terror activities, which his lawyers and friends denied as baseless and said were rooted in mistakes and misinterpretations.
Ratliff said that he had requested a status conference over another discrepancy between the termination notice USCIS sent Soliman in June and the one the agency had submitted as an exhibit in court just a few hours before he heard from USCIS on Friday. The latter notice claimed that Soliman was a member of a terrorist group, a claim DHS relied on to argue against granting him bond, he said.
“What everybody needs to take away from this [case] is this is going to be the new pattern and practice of DHS to try to force people to voluntarily leave,” Ratliff added. “If you have the right to stay in the United States, and if you have the ability to fight it, you’re going to have to be extremely detailed and extremely aggressive about pursuing your relief.”
In a statement, a DHS official told Salon that an immigrant “even with a pending application or lawful status — is not shielded from immigration enforcement action,” adding that USCIS can’t discuss the details of individual cases or adjudication decisions.
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Now that his asylum status has been reinstated, Soliman’s other immigration hurdles should also be squared away, Ratliff said. Soliman’s next step will be to apply for a green card again, which will bring him one step closer to reuniting with the family members the threat of political persecution in Egypt forced him to leave behind.
Soliman told supporters and press Friday evening that in the immediate future, he’ll be reacclimating to normal life, catching up on sleep, eating regular food and taking time to himself to process the mental wounds and scars his detention left him with. He said he couldn’t believe that he was free, that he’d just gathered with loved ones and eaten lunch at a restaurant with fruits and salad.
Then the imam left his audience with an admonishment of the Trump administration and a call to action.
“We have been told that they were detaining and deporting the worst of the worst, and I can tell you firsthand that I’ve seen the best of the best, unjustly detained and unjustly deported — and many of them were legal,” he said.
“This fascist government is so weak when they find brave advocates like you who can raise their voice,” Soliman added, the room erupting in applause. “The noise you make makes a difference. … Don’t underestimate your voice.”
Soliman thanked his supporters once more before retreating from the podium. The call to prayer sounded over the mosque’s speakers.
