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In a sit-down interview Friday, Kehoe dismissed claims that the map is unconstitutional. He also denied that there is an error in the “Missouri First Map” that lawmakers passed during a special session last week.

by Hannah Allam

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An Egyptian chaplain whose detention sparked a community uproar and became a test of counterterrorism powers in immigration court was released from an Ohio jail on Friday as the Department of Homeland Security abruptly withdrew its case against him.

The outcome is a victory for 51-year-old Ayman Soliman, a popular Muslim cleric whose hundreds of supporters include families he counseled at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital. The DHS move to restore his asylum status and drop deportation efforts comes after court filings documented errors and inconsistencies in the government’s evidence portraying him as a terrorist.

Just before 1 p.m., Soliman walked out of Butler County Jail with a broad smile and a plastic bag containing his belongings, a moment filmed by his friends and advocates. He had been scheduled for an immigration trial next week and faced deportation to Egypt, which he fled in 2014 because of political persecution.

“This is beyond my dreams,” Soliman told ProPublica in a call minutes after he was freed. “I’m still overwhelmed by the surprise.”

Soliman’s asylum status was reinstated and his application for a green card has been revived, said Robert Ratliff, one of his attorneys. Early Friday, Ratliff had filed documents showing wording discrepancies in what should have been identical asylum termination notices to Soliman. One version called him a “member” of a terrorist group and the other accused him of providing illegal aid to a terrorist group. Soliman has denied both contentions.

The filing on Friday documented the latest in a series of inconsistencies in the government’s evidence, which ProPublica reported this month.

“From the beginning, everything was flawed,” Ratliff said. “This is certainly a victory for him, and it’s huge. Unfortunately, he had to spend approximately 70 days in jail to get to this point.”

A DHS official said immigration authorities “cannot discuss the details of individual immigration cases and adjudication decisions.” But the official added, “An alien — even with a pending application or lawful status — is not shielded from immigration enforcement action.” The agency is “responsible for administering America’s lawful immigration system, ensuring the integrity of the immigration process.”

After leaving the jail, Soliman joined Friday communal prayers at a local mosque, where an imam welcomed his release as a godsend and celebrated his friend as “a free man, as he always should be.”

Flanked by supporters at a news conference Friday evening, Soliman said he was still in disbelief that his day had begun in custody. He’d just come from a restaurant where he enjoyed “salad and fruit and meat” after weeks of jail food. He said he was “out of words” for the support system that sprang to his defense. He said he received 760 letters while in jail from people he’d never met.

“I’m free today because of this advocacy,” Soliman said. “Don’t underestimate your voice.”

Ayman Soliman Is Free Soliman is greeted as he exits Butler County Jail in Ohio. (Courtesy of Ahmed Elkady)

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Soliman’s ordeal, which spanned two administrations, is more complex than most targets of President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown.

After fleeing persecution over his journalistic and protest activities in Egypt, Soliman had been granted asylum in 2018 under the first Trump administration. Then, in the last month of the presidency of Joe Biden, immigration authorities moved to revoke the status based on sharply disputed claims of fraud and aid to a terrorist group. Once Trump returned to office weeks later, court records show, immigration officials bumped up the terrorism claims and formalized the asylum termination on June 3.

DHS had built the case on allegations that Soliman’s involvement with an Islamic charity provided illegal aid, or “material support,” to the Muslim Brotherhood. But neither the charity nor the Brotherhood is a U.S.-designated terrorist organization, and an Egyptian court found no official ties between the groups.

Material support laws ban almost any type of aid to U.S.-designated foreign terrorist groups. Prosecutors describe the laws as an invaluable tool against would-be attackers, but civil liberties groups have long complained of overreach.

The Biden-era DHS, which first flagged the charity issue, said it would revoke Soliman’s asylum if “a preponderance of the evidence supports termination” after a hearing, according to the December 2024 notice. At the time, court records show, the material support allegation was listed as a secondary concern after more common asylum questions about the veracity of official documents and Soliman’s claims of persecution in Egypt.

Once Trump came to power weeks later, Soliman’s attorneys said, the material support claims metastasized, with U.S. authorities declaring the Muslim Brotherhood a Tier III, or undesignated, terrorist group and adding new arguments about ties to Hamas. The Brotherhood, a nearly century-old Islamist political movement, renounced violence in the 1970s, though Hamas and other spinoffs are on the U.S. blacklist.

Court filings show DHS attorneys introducing, then withdrawing or amending, materials to build a case linking Soliman to the Brotherhood through the charity. Almost immediately, the evidence began unraveling.

Among the supporting documents filed by the government were three academic reports by scholars with deep knowledge of Islamic charities in Egypt. Soliman’s legal team filed statements from all three balking at how DHS had cherry-picked their research. The scholars described “important mistakes of fact and interpretation,” “a mischaracterization” and “a dishonest manipulation of my text.”

Separate from U.S. attempts to tie Soliman to the Brotherhood was a puzzling footnote in which DHS attorneys alluded to warrants for “murder and terrorism” in Iraq, a country Soliman has never visited. DHS acknowledged in court that the line had been an error — after it had been included in the government’s successful argument for keeping him in custody.

Legal scholars specializing in national security were monitoring the case as a gauge of how much power the Trump administration could wield at the intersection of counterterrorism and immigration.

Ratliff said that the win was important but that he didn’t think the outcome would deter DHS from invoking similar arguments in other immigration cases, especially involving cartels, which the Trump administration designated as terrorist organizations, unlocking material support powers.

“The connections in this case were always going to be too tenuous to withstand scrutiny,” Ratliff said. “I think, though, that this format is still the format we’re going to see DHS take.”

Soliman’s supporters — from religious leaders to university students to parents he met at the hospital — welcomed his release.

“I know tomorrow he’ll get right back to the work he does, of caring for his community,” said Lynn Tramonte, executive director of the Ohio Immigrant Alliance, one of the advocacy groups that pushed for his release.

September I just need to say this: it’s been a weird September so far. Normally, the first couple of weeks are kind of hot and humid. And it’s not until about the third week that we see a cooldown into a fall mode. This year, the cool rolled in late August, and we had a [...]

It’s been days since Belleville resident Becky Stapleton has seen her longtime pet tortoise, Butters.

But he rejected a request by abortion-rights advocates to block the proposed constitutional amendment from going to voters.

FAIRVIEW HEIGHTS – Attorney General Kwame Raoul charged a Fairview Heights, Illinois man for allegedly disseminating child sexual abuse material and failing to register as a sex offender. The case is part of Raoul’s ongoing work, in collaboration with federal law enforcement agencies and local law enforcement officials throughout Illinois, to apprehend offenders who download and trade child sexual abuse material online. The Attorney General’s office charged Donald L. Green, 56, in St. Clair County Circuit Court with three counts of dissemination of child pornography, Class X felonies punishable up to 30 years in prison and three counts of failure to register as a sex offender-subsequent, Class 2 felonies punishable up to seven years. Sentences are ultimately determined by the court. Green is currently detained at the St. Clair County Jail, and his next court appearance is Sept. 26. “Survivors of child exploitation and their families deserve the justice

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WASHINGTON, D.C. — Today, Congresswoman Nikki Budzinski (IL-13) released the following statement after joining her Democratic colleagues in voting against the Republican Continuing Resolution. “From the start, Democrats have been clear about what we’re fighting for on behalf of the American people. If Republicans wanted Democrats to join them in passing a government funding package, they needed to put forward measures that would stop their manufactured healthcare crisis. “They had a chance to extend Affordable Care Act tax credits that save families thousands of dollars a year on their care. They had the chance to prevent devastating Medicaid cuts that would strip coverage from low-income families and threaten nursing home closures across Illinois. “But Republicans refused. So today, my Democratic colleagues and I refused to back legislation that ignores this crisis, slashes healthcare, drives up costs, and leaves working families behind.”

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GODFREY - The Great Godfrey Maze opens this weekend, promising fun for families across the Riverbend region. From 6–10 p.m. on Sept. 19, 2025, community members can enjoy the Great Godfrey Maze at Glazebook Park, complete with activities, inflatables and more fun. The maze and its activities will be open from 6–10 p.m. on Fridays, 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. on Saturdays, and 12–6 p.m. on Sundays through Nov. 2, 2025. “ I know people really enjoy it. I love seeing the smiles on their faces,” said Chris Logan, director of Godfrey’s Parks and Recreation Department. “We’re really proud to be able to offer this to the community. It's a great opportunity for families, at a reasonable price, to come out as a family and enjoy themselves.” This year’s maze has a “Minions” theme. The corn was planted in the shape of a minion from the movie “Despicable Me.” Attendees can traverse the maze and navigate their wa

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Some residents expressed concern that repeated crashes could damage the overpass.

The news is positive for the roughly 800 workers still employed at the facility as of this month.

ST. LOUIS - Striking Boeing union members have approved a new union proposal offer on Friday morning, Sept. 19, 2025, via a vote that could potentially end their walkout. The offer, approved by 90% of union voters, now heads to Boeing’s company leadership for review. Some of the 3,200 members of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM District 837) have been on strike since August 4, 2025. Following the union-proposed offer ratified by union members, Boeing shared this statement: “It’s unfortunate that union leadership led its members to vote on something that isn’t real. Our previous offer is real and would make our team among the highest-paid manufacturing employees in the St. Louis area. Most people would not consider a 45% average wage increase, free primary care, and more vacation time unfair or disrespectful. We want all 3,200 of our teammates back at work, but that has to happen with a contract that makes sense in the Midwest

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Twisted Sister recently announced that they will be reuniting for their 50th anniversary, and now the first show on their 2026 schedule has been revealed.The band — Dee Snider, Jay Jay French and Eddie Ojeda — has…

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The small plane with three people aboard crashed Thursday afternoon "under unknown circumstances" in the woods in Franklin, North Carolina.

A Florissant man was sentenced to decades behind bars over a deadly St. Louis street-racing crash.

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration Friday made an emergency appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court to pause a district court’s order that blocked the Department of Homeland Security from ending temporary protections for roughly 350,000 Venezuelans. In an emergency brief, U.S. Solicitor D. John Sauer argued that DHS Secretary Kristi Noem has the authority to […]

ALTON - Alton’s Fall City-Wide Litter Clean-Up will be held on Saturday, October 4th, from 9:00 a.m. until 12:00 p.m., rain or shine. The community is invited to pitch in by picking up bags, gloves, a free donut, and directions to areas that need cleaning. Registration stations are open from 9am- 11am and are located Downtown at the corner of 3rd & Belle St., in Middletown at Fast Eddies Chicken at 7th and Central Ave. At 9:00 a.m., groups are departing in Upper Alton, across the street from Taqueria Maya on College Ave and in North Alton from Joe K’s Restaurant, located at 2530 State St where additional supplies will be stocked if needed. Groups can pick up supplies at Great Rivers and Routes Tourism Center at 200 Piasa St, at the Pride, Inc office located within the Benjamin Godfrey mansion, and at Flock Food Truck Court two weeks prior. Alternatively, volunteers can simply pick up litter in their neighborhood and deposit it in their own trash & recycle bins. The

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