ICE releases wife of US soldier and Afghanistan veteran from detention

US Immigration and Customs Enforcement has released the wife of a US Army sergeant and Afghanistan veteran from detention, her lawyer confirmed to the BBC.

Deisy Rivera Ortega, who came to the US from El Salvador, was arrested on 14 April when she and her husband, Sgt Jose Serrano, went in for a scheduled immigration appointment in El Paso, Texas.

Serrano, who has served in the military for nearly 28 years, told the BBC that his wife's detention had left him distraught.

"We celebrate her release," Matthew James Kozik, the family's attorney, said in a statement.

The Department of Homeland Security and ICE did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In a video he shared with CBS News, Serrano can be seen driving home with his wife in the passengers' seat.

"Deisy is out of the detention facility and we're going home today," he said.

At the time of her arrest, Serrano and Rivera Ortega were applying for a programme called parole-in-place, which allows military spouses to remain in the US while their immigration cases move forward

The couple had gathered documentation about their marriage, work, and status, according to paperwork her attorney provided the BBC. The couple married in 2022, according to a marriage certificate, and Serrano was born in Puerto Rico, making him a US citizen by birth.

During their appointment, immigration authorities said there was an issue with the documentation, Serrano told the BBC. They led the couple down a hallway, where officers suddenly detained Rivera Ortega.

DHS said that Rivera Ortega was a "criminal illegal alien from El Salvador" convicted of the "federal offense" of entering the US illegally. Rivera Ortega crossed the US-Mexico border in 2016, DHS said.

In 2019, a judge ordered Rivera Ortega's removal from the US to El Salvador, but in the same court order, granted her a protection known as withholding of removal under the convention against torture.

It prevented ICE from deporting Rivera Ortega to her home country due to concerns she could face harm.

As a result, Serrano and Kozik said that after her arrest, officials considered deporting her to Mexico.

US Senator Tammy Duckworth, an Illinois Democrat and Iraq War veteran, called Department of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin on Wednesday regarding the issue, her office said.

"I am so incredibly grateful for Deisy's release and for her to be reunited with her family," Duckworth said in a statement.

"Deisy was doing everything 'the right way': attending her military parole in-place interview when she was detained by ICE with no warrant and no explanation," Duckworth said. "There is no higher betrayal to our heroes than to have one of their family members deported by the same nation they sacrificed to defend."

DHS did not respond to the BBC's inquiry about the call from Duckworth to Mullin.

Rivera Ortega was the second incident in April in which ICE detained the wife of an active US servicemember. Annie Ramos, wife of Sergeant Matthew Blank, was held for five days before ICE released her. Ramos is an undocumented immigrant from Honduras who was brought to the US as a child.