Wife of US Army sergeant released after month in ICE custody
The wife of an active-duty U.S. Army sergeant with 27 years of service was released from immigration custody on Thursday.
Deisy Fidelina Rivera Ortega was taken into custody on April 14 in El Paso, Texas, while attending a routine immigration interview related to a "Parole in Place" application -- a program designed to allow undocumented family members of military personnel to remain in the U.S. legally.
She was released after being in federal custody for one month, her attorney told ABC News.
Rivera Ortega is married to Sgt. 1st Class Jose Serrano, a U.S. Army sergeant stationed at Fort Bliss who has been deployed to Afghanistan three times. He told ABC News last month that he and his wife had been "doing everything by the book."
"She goes to work or to church," Serrano said. "That's the life of my wife, Deisy."
Democratic Sen. Tammy Duckworth said she personally called Department of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin to request Rivera Ortega's release.
"I'm thankful to Secretary Mullin for heeding my personal call to release Deisy, but she -- and so many others -- should never have been in this situation to begin with," Duckworth said in a statement to ABC News.
"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," said Duckworth, a Army veteran. "There is no higher betrayal to our heroes than having one of their family members deported by the same nation they sacrificed to defend."
In a statement, a spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security said, "On April 14, ICE arrested Deisy Fidelina Rivera-Ortega, an illegal alien from El Salvador. Rivera-Ortega entered the U.S. in 2016 near Rio Grande Valley, Texas, and was released on bond. An immigration judge issued her a final order of removal on December 12, 2019. Rivera-Ortega has been released from ICE custody with a GPS tracking device, mandatory home visits, and ICE office check-ins. She will receive full due process."
Rivera Ortega -- who currently works for IHG Army Hotels at Fort Bliss -- has a valid work permit through 2030 and was previously granted withholding of removal from her home country, El Salvador, according to documents reviewed by ABC News.
After being detained in April, she was facing deportation to a third country.
