A U.S. soldier’s wife, Maisa Lopes Eliaser, who spent more than a month in federal immigration detention, said she is back home after officers removed her from a deportation flight to Brazil. Eliaser was placed on a deportation flight when U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers on the plane received a phone call about her midflight, she told the AP.

Background

Earlier this month, The Associated Press highlighted Maisa Lopes Eliaser as one of dozens of spouses or parents of U.S. troops who had been detained after President Donald Trump’s administration rolled back protections for military families amid its push for mass deportations. Following the AP’s reporting, a group of Congressional Democrats launched an investigation into deportations of military service members and their families.

Eliaser was detained in July while at an immigration appointment. Her husband, Army Staff Sgt. Alexis Jaramillo, a 43-year-old aviation operations specialist who has served in the Army for more than a decade, took leave of his duties training soldiers in Fort Polk, Louisiana, to care for Eliaser’s 5-year-old son after she was detained.

Reaction

Danitza James, who heads Repatriate Our Patriots, a nonprofit that supports military families facing deportation and helped with Eliaser’s case, said at a news conference: “This family’s reunion is proof of what’s possible when people set politics aside and do right by those who serve.”

Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly of Arizona, a former Navy officer, directly contacted the ICE field office involved in Eliaser’s detention, according to his spokesperson. He has also spoken out on behalf of two other detained military family members in the past year.

Kelly said the policy of detaining military family members is “wrong and makes no sense at all.”

Eliaser, who was detained in July while at an immigration appointment, has another appointment scheduled for Monday in an effort to reopen her case and advance her green card application. Jaramillo is a U.S. citizen and the couple have been married since 2024.

Original reporting: Dallas TX News (HLL/CB) — read the source article.