A local pastor who came to the U.S. seeking asylum nearly a decade ago and lives in Westbrook was taken into custody by immigration officials last week, according to his family.

Michel Tshimankinda was leaving with his wife from her workplace on Aug. 14 when agents from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, descended on them in the parking lot, demanding identification, his daughter said in an interview Monday.

Jobel Tshimankinda said her parents told her they handed over their IDs and were escorted back to their home in Westbrook, where agents detained her father.

Hours later, she said, the family received a call from a correctional facility. It was her father.

“I do really miss my dad, and he has so many people who are deeply hurt by this,” she said. “It’s still really hard to talk about. … I feel like the energy of my home has shifted so much in his absence.”

ICE has reported through its online tracker that Michel Tshimankinda is being held at a prison in New Hampshire.

ICE spokesperson James Covington said in a statement Tuesday morning that Michel Tshimankinda was detained Wednesday through “targeted enforcement operations in Portland” and that he had overstayed a temporary visa in 2016. Covington said it was part of the Trump administration’s focus on increased immigration enforcement.

“Unlike the previous administration, President Trump and (Department of Homeland Security) Secretary Noem will not turn a blind eye to violations of U.S. immigration laws,” Covington said. “They remain dedicated to prioritizing safety and protecting the integrity of our nation’s immigration laws by arresting and removing illegal alien offenders in a safe, secure and expeditious manner.”

Jobel Tshimankinda said that, before coming to the U.S., her father had been a pastor for several years in Botswana, where the family was able to temporarily escape violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo. She said her family arrived in the United States around 2016 on temporary visas, immediately applying for asylum before their documentation expired. She said that allowed them to obtain legal identification and work permits.

“We made sure to do it the right way,” she said.

Covington, in the statement, didn’t mention whether Michel Tshimankinda had applied for asylum and he wasn’t able to provide further information Tuesday on whether that would have mattered to ICE.

Michel Tshimankinda, whose family says he also worked in health care as a lab technician, spent his first several years in Maine attending LifeChurch in Gorham.

“He was like, I don’t want to beg for a pastoral position. I just want to be taught,” Jobel Tshimankinda said. “He would sit in the pews and worship and enjoy the message.”

Eventually, she said, after about a year of holding a weekly service at home, her father launched his own church in South Portland, welcoming a multicultural congregation of other immigrants who craved community but struggled in other churches with language barriers. As senior pastor, Michel Tshimankinda regularly counsels people in times of grief, offers marriage advice, quells drama, prays for people and rallies support when his neighbors are struggling, his daughter said.

She was struck by the impact her father’s arrest has had on the immigrant community, which her parents have invested so much in.

“Obviously, there is a lot of fear surrounding this,” Jobel Tshimankinda said. “But I also think that it’s really unfortunate in a place where freedom is the tagline, it doesn’t feel like that sometimes.”

Over the years, she said, her father has made friends not only in faith, but through his work in health care and driving Ubers.

Now, Jobel Tshimankinda said, that same community is rallying behind her father.

She said the family is working on securing her father legal representation and that they are requesting a bond hearing for him in immigration court. As of Monday, the family had raised more than $20,000 on Gofundme, with multiple people chiming in to apologize and wish Michel a speedy journey home.

“He’s all these things — he’s a dad, he’s a friend, a pastor, a homeowner, a church owner,” she said. “He has a stable job, with no criminal record … He should be able to come home. And we fully believe he will be back to us. No matter what it takes, he will be back.”

Pastor Brian Undlin of LifeChurch in Gorham, who has known Michel Tshimankinda since 2016, said Tuesday that many people in their church are shocked by his detention.

“Even the people in the church that watch the news who have supported every ICE arrest they’re like ‘Oh my gosh, this can’t be happening to Michel,'” Undlin said.

To Undlin, Michel Tshimankinda had “done everything he can” to move his immigration case forward.

“A majority of people assume that if you do everything that you’re supposed to do, the system will take care of it,” Undlin said. “But it doesn’t.”

Jobel Tshimankinda urged other immigrants to be cautious, but to surround themselves with a “strong support system” like her family has — the same system her father built up.

She said her father’s congregation still gathered on Sunday, even without their senior pastor, to sing songs of freedom and joy amid chaos.

“At the end of the service, we had a prayer circle and we just prayed for my dad,” she said. “It was a beautiful moment — not just to know that my dad has the support of the church and the people in his congregation, but to know that this has affected them so much.”