Photograph by Mike James
The story of the Cairo, Egypt, native Iman Ayman Soliman is the story of too many immigrants in America. On July 9, during a check-in at ICE’s Blue Ash office, he was arrested and transferred to the Butler County Jail, a facility that’s been described as having concentration camp-like conditions and where less than 8 percent of detainees were actually found to have violated immigration laws.
What should have been a short-term incarceration mushroomed into 73 days, during which Soliman spent 19 hours a day in his cell with no access to sunlight. A July 17 vigil for him escalated into a violent protest on the Roebling Suspension Bridge. Covington Police arrested 15 people, including two CityBeat journalists. Finally, after a lengthy legal battle, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security dropped the charges on September 19 and released him.
Since his release, Soliman has been giving nonstop interviews and doing speaking engagements around Cincinnati and Dayton. People line up to greet and thank him for his bravery and say they’re happy to see him alive. On October 3, he returned to the Clifton Mosque and gave two sermons, his first in four months. “It’s beyond what I can describe,” he says. The U.S. government has reinstated his asylum, and he’s in the process of obtaining a green card.
Through a few interviews—including Soliman speaking to advisor and former Students for Justice in Palestine UC Laila Shaikh and a talk to the UC Muslim Student Association—he opened up about his harrowing experiences and adjusting to life after imprisonment:
I was a journalist in Egypt during the Arab Spring, which started at the end of 2010. I got into trouble with the criminal regime that came after the military coup. In 2014, I came to the U.S. on a visa to study film in Chicago. Unfortunately after I came here, the government broke into my house [in Egypt] and my life became at risk if I went back. I got detained four times and tortured in Egypt under two regimes. But what was planned to be a few months ended up being 11 and a half years. At the end of 2014/the beginning of 2015, I applied for asylum in the U.S. based on this circumstance. In June 2018, I was granted asylum after three and a half years of investigation. I haven’t seen a family member since I moved here.
I came to Cincinnati in 2021 and joined Cincinnati Children’s Hospital [as its first and only Muslim chaplain]. In 2018, after a series of harassment from government agencies that took different forms, I had to file some lawsuits against certain agencies in the administration thinking that I had constitutional rights and this would actually help me get my rights. Unfortunately when I started suing the government, it seemed like it triggered them.
The hospital terminated my salary in June 2025, followed by a deportation proceeding, which meant I had to appear before a judge to decide if I have eligibility to stay on asylum or if I should be deported. Of course deportation means death. This is exactly what the government of Egypt would do.
It’s Tuesday, July 9. I was at the beginning of my court proceedings, which was expected to take six months. There was no legal reason to get me detained, especially with my great reputation. We had an unprecedented number of character statements sent to the judge. I didn’t have a criminal record, but unfortunately it was an interview about everything in my life, including my religious views. There’s nothing in my past that I believed was shameful or went against the law or the Constitution in the U.S., and I answered my questions with transparency.
They charged me at 2 p.m. at the ICE facility in Blue Ash and took me to jail at 3 p.m. I remained in one of the freezing rooms. And that’s another thing they do: kill humanity. They took off my clothes and left just my T-shirt and my pants on, and put me with 12, 14 people in a literal freezing room. This room was like 30 degrees. The hallway outside was 70 degrees. It’s intentional in order to punish people. And I spent like 13 hours in this room.
I interacted with at least 150 humans, some of the most beautiful human beings I’d ever met in my life. I would say the absolute majority of these people were documented. They had work permits. They paid their taxes. They had driver’s licenses. So saying that they are smugglers and they are undocumented is not true. Also claiming that they’re the worst of the worst, all criminals—this is not true, at least from what I’ve seen.
I listened to their stories and I knew that unfortunately this country is deporting some of these people, some of the great human beings who did not do anything wrong. Some of them have never even gotten a traffic ticket in their life. Some spend 28 years in this country and have kids who are serving in the military. And some people do not have other countries to go to.
I almost believed that I would never go to the Clifton Mosque again. I would never be able to go to a restaurant again. I’m going to be taken from here to the airport and it’s over. If I’m lucky and these efforts paid off, they might put me in another country like Honduras or El Salvador, or by miracle Turkey or South Africa, so I would avoid getting killed in Egypt.
I never saw what it’s like to see the light. I didn’t see human beings beyond the people who lived with me or visitors through video conference. I never ate any type of fruit for 73 days. Even if I wanted to pay money, there’s nothing. I never ate a raw, fresh vegetable.
When I asked why this happened to me, I am sure Allah never inflicts us with something beyond what we can handle. Nothing is bigger than Allah. No problem is bigger than Allah, and no suffering is bigger than what he can relieve. There’s always some good in any situation. Having a big test is a good thing. It’s actually a sign of good faith. Although this experience was the most traumatic of my life, I’m thanking Allah for everything.
I never imagined that I’d be out—that’s why I did not have a plan for what is next. I will focus on two things: my well-being and to get over this traumatic experience, and also to advocate for these people. My message is that noise actually works. Advocacy does work, plus the collective effort is a very, very important thing to do.
I’m so grateful for the community, the mini communities, the broader communities in Cincinnati, tri-state, and all over the country. People who were working on my behalf made it a national case and they kept pushing, pushing. And at the time when the government wanted to hide my name and hide me in the paperwork, the community kept saying my name out loud. They were creative in finding ways to keep the community engaged, and the media found it impossible to ignore this. I’m so grateful for the professional journalists who kept following and following this pressure, and the people who pressured some representatives to be involved and to believe that this is not OK.
I think my story also taught me and taught everyone else that when the community comes together, things happen. It was really inspiring to see churches open us, the doors for interfaith prayers for our Muslim imam. We saw a Christian church send letters to a Jewish representative to advocate for a Muslim imam. People across the spectrum came together. This will impact my involvement in the community to advocate for the marginalized, be it the homeless or people who are facing deportation.
The brutality of the government made me question whether or not I would consider the U.S. my home, but this is my city. What happened to me in Cincinnati, Covington, Northern Kentucky, and the tri-state was beyond anyone would expect. Without these efforts, without the compassionate support, I would never be out.
These days, I eat what I want when I want. I go to sleep when I want. I wake up when I want because I was deprived of these rights for 73 days. Somebody decided when I should go to bed. Somebody decided when and what I should eat. I was literally locked in by myself for 19 hours every single day. A small box inside a big box is exactly what we had. My piece of advice is to enjoy and appreciate what we have because at some point we might be deprived of it. I really try to appreciate life more.
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