ST. PAUL — Minnesota Gov. Mark Dayton is asking immigration officials not to deport a professor at Augsburg College to Kenya.

Dayton sent a letter Wednesday to Thomas Homan, acting director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, asking him to allow Mzenga Wanyama to stay in the United States.

Dayton calls Wanyama “a great asset to Minnesota” and says deporting him would be “a terrible loss to the hundreds of students he influences” and also to his family and friends.