President Trump's immigration agents just fast-tracked three more persecuted Indonesian Christians for deportation - all family men with no criminal records; longtime New Jerseyans who sought asylum here.



Rovani Wangko and Saul Timisela were put on a plane immediately after their requests to stay were denied, joining a Metuchen father who was deported last month.

A third man, Oldy Manopo, remains at the Elizabeth detention center but faces imminent deportation.



Wangko, a newlywed, didn't even get a chance to say goodbye to his wife. When she arrived at the Elizabeth detention center to visit him on Thursday, as she's faithfully done every night since he was imprisoned, "they said there's no Rovani here," Rev. Seth Kaper-Dale, a local advocate for immigrants recounted.

2 N.J. Indonesians deported after long battle to stay in U.S.



That's how Wangko's 22 years in America came to an end. It was much the same for Arino Massie, who didn't get to say goodbye to his 13-year-old son Joel, who was in school when his father was put on a plane and deported last month.



When the boy, a U.S. citizen and Edison middle schooler, tried to describe to reporters what it felt like to have his father suddenly ripped from his life, he broke down in tears.



Under the Obama administration, Immigration and Customs Enforcement ultimately used its discretion to allow these men to stay, since they were so obviously harmless.



They entered the U.S. legally on tourist visas up to 20 years ago, and made two fateful mistakes: They missed the one-year deadline to apply for asylum, and dutifully registered with the U.S. government after 9-11, as male temporary visa holders from Muslim nations were required to - even though they are Christian.

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That put them on the radar of ICE. But all four are hard workers in blue-collar jobs, church volunteers who helped pack food and supplies for the victims of Hurricane Sandy - not the "egregious, violent offenders" ICE claims to focus on.



Its arrests are up nearly 40 percent since Trump took office, compared with the same period last year; but truth is, more than half this increase is due to arrests of immigrants who had committed no crime other than being here without permission. Not "bad hombres."



Are we supposed to believe that tearing these men away from their children and grandchildren is making America safer?



They fled Indonesia, a Muslim-majority country, because of religious persecution, and have good reason to fear going back. A top Christian official was just imprisoned there for so-called blasphemy against Islam.



One of the deported men, Timisela, escaped in the late 90's after anti-Christian rioters decapitated a relative who was a pastor and burned down his church, he previously told the New York Times. He came to the U.S. for a youth conference, and his family urged him to stay.



"I hope they understand what we're doing here," he said of the U.S. government. "We're looking for a better life, freedom of worship."



Manopo, the last man whose request to stay was reportedly denied, said he originally fled Indonesia after armed Muslims attacked his church and rioters threatened his wife's company. Now he's the father of two kids, one who attended Middlesex County College, and several American grandchildren.



Will they even have the chance to say goodbye?

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