CINCINNATI — Ayman Soliman, who had served as a Muslim chaplain at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center, walked out of Butler County Jail here on Sept. 19. After 72 days in immigration detention, the federal government dropped all charges against him and restored his asylum status.
“I am indebted to those who advocated for me,” Soliman told the press. “What you’ve done tells us we’re strong when we act together,” Soliman told his supporters. “The noise you made makes a difference.”
Public protests after he was imprisoned and an open letter by more than 400 Christian, Jewish and Muslim clergy calling for his release helped publicize his case and win his freedom.
Soliman left Egypt in 2014 after having been jailed and tortured following a military coup by Gen. Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, head of the Egyptian armed forces. Soliman was imprisoned for reporting on the mass, popular Arab Spring protests that brought down the Hosni Mubarak regime.
He was arrested and imprisoned by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in July, a month after his asylum status was revoked. It had been approved under the first Donald Trump administration in 2018.
Federal officials initially moved to revoke his asylum in December 2024, while Joseph Biden was still president. The government claimed Al-Gam’iyya al-Shar’yya, a prominent, social services charity he was involved with in Egypt, had some ties with the Muslim Brotherhood. That amounted to “material support to terrorism,” officials said.
After Soliman was seized by ICE, he was imprisoned with hundreds of other immigrants in the Butler County Jail. “They said they would deport the worst of the worst,” Soliman told the media. “But what I saw in jail with me was the best of the best unjustly imprisoned. Everyone has the right to due process.”
“Ayman Soliman’s release is an example of the fact that innocent people are being held in ICE custody for no reason,” Samantha Searls, program director for Ignite Peace, told the Militant. Her organization, backed by a number of churches and religious groups in the area, helped organize the campaign to free Soliman.
Soliman said he received 760 letters of support while he was in prison. “That lifted up the spirits, not only mine, but my fellow inmates — that one of the oppressed among them had support.”