Two Christian sisters have been freed from an ICE detention centre, after two months in custody.
Mahan and Mojan Motahari belonged to St Thomas Church in McLean, Virginia. They had sought asylum from Iran, on the basis of Christian persecution. Both were in the United States legally at the time of their arrest.
The women were described as “kind” and “the nicest people” by their pastor, Rev Fran Gardner-Smith.
“It just [broke] my heart,” she told NBC Washington.
The sisters were arrested after travelling to the Virgin Islands on 1st December. They were then moved to Broward Transitional Center in Pompano Beach, Florida, where they were held until their release.
Rev Gardner-Smith said she was “delighted beyond [her] wildest imagination” at the sisters’ freedom, but emphasised that their outcome is a “drop in the bucket” of Trump’s immigration crackdown.
“These are just two people who are caught in a system that’s so broken right now around immigration and they’ve done nothing wrong,” she said.
According to Politifact, like the sisters, over a third of those in ICE detention have no criminal convictions.