Join us in urging the Biden administration and ICE to release Mohammad from prolonged incarceration immediately and ensure he has access to a fair and full trial.
Mohammad is an ethnic Hazara man who fled Afghanistan after being targeted by the Taliban when they took power in 2021. He escaped by the only available route: a perilous journey that led to the southern U.S. border where he would seek asylum.
In Afghanistan, Mohammad was a professor with a history of advocacy for women’s rights and for victims of the Taliban and other extremist groups. Mohammad’s wife also had ties to the US government. Through her prior work, she has an initially approved Special Immigrant Visa application that gives Mohammad a pathway to U.S. permanent residence.
Despite this, Mohammad was criminally prosecuted for entering the United States to seek asylum. He spent 7 months in prison before being transferred to ICE custody, where he is still detained. ICE has repeatedly denied his release into the community despite his having permanent resident family living in the U.S. ready to receive him.
Mohammad was forced to undergo his asylum case without an attorney while detained in immigration jail. Despite surviving multiple attacks on his life by the Taliban and ISIS-K, an immigration judge denied Mohammad’s asylum claim.
If forced to return to Afghanistan, he faces significant risks to his life and safety as the Taliban continue to search for him.