Trump administration gets permission to deport Mahmud Khalil

 An immigration judge on Friday ruled that the Trump administration can deport Columbia University graduate student Mahmoud Khalil, a decision that comes a month after his arrest prompted national outrage and marked the start of the federal government's broader crackdown on foreign students.

The Louisiana judge affirmed the Trump administration's argument that Khalil's beliefs threaten national security and justify his deportation."The court will sustain the charge of removability," Judge Jamee Comans said.

Khalil, 30, has until April 23 to file for relief and can remain in the United States until then. A federal judge in New Jersey has temporarily barred Khalil's deportation while he fights a similar challenge there.

Khalil addressed the court after the ruling.

"I would like to quote what you said last time that there's nothing that's more important to this court than due process rights and fundamental fairness," he said in a statement his defense team presented after the hearing. "Clearly what we witnessed today, neither of these principles were present today or in this whole process. This is exactly why the Trump administration has sent me to this court, 1,000 miles away from my family. I just hope that the urgency that you deemed fit for me are afforded to the hundreds of others who have been here without hearing for months."Mahmoud Khalil stands by the gates of Columbia University on April 30, 2024.

His legal team said it will "continue working tirelessly until Mahmoud is free." “Today, we saw our worst fears play out: Mahmoud was subject to a charade of due process, a flagrant violation of his right to a fair hearing, and a weaponization of immigration law to suppress dissent," his attorney, Marc van der Hout, said in a statement. "This is not over, and our fight continues."Khalil's defense team is seeking a preliminary injunction from the federal court in New Jersey. It would release him from custody and could block the Trump administration policy of arresting and detaining noncitizens for speech critical of Israel and in support of Palestinian people in Gaza, the team said in its statement on Friday.

Defense team attorney Ramzi Kassem said on MSNBC Friday that the lawyers immediately went before the New Jersey-based federal court to update it on the matter in Louisiana, as ordered.

He argued the Trump administration's strategy in the case, to fight for every possible legal justification, is "backfiring for them" and exposing the case as driven by Khalil's speech.

"For a country that values free speech, … that should just not be possible," he said of possible deportation over Khalil's participation in campus protests.

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem in a statement Friday called Khalil. She accused him, without providing evidence, of supporting terrorists and harassing people based on their faith.

Associated Press: Pressed for evidence against Mahmoud Khalil, government cites its power to deport people for beliefs

 NEW YORK (AP) — Facing a deadline from an immigration judge to turn over evidence for its attempted deportation of Columbia University activist Mahmoud Khalil, the federal government has instead submitted a brief memo, signed by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, citing the Trump administration’s authority to expel noncitizens whose presence in the country damages U.S. foreign policy interests.

The two-page memo, which was obtained by The Associated Press, does not allege any criminal conduct by Khalil, a legal permanent U.S. resident and graduate student who served as spokesperson for campus activists last year during large demonstrations against Israel's treatment of Palestinians and the war in Gaza.

Rather, Rubio wrote Khalil could be expelled for his beliefs.

He said that while Khalil's activities were “otherwise lawful,” letting him remain in the country would undermine “U.S. policy to combat anti-Semitism around the world and in the United States, in addition to efforts to protect Jewish students from harassment and violence in the United States.”

“Condoning anti-Semitic conduct and disruptive protests in the United States would severely undermine that significant foreign policy objective," Rubio wrote in the undated memo.

The submission was filed Wednesday after Judge Jamee Comans ordered the government to produce its evidence against Khalil ahead of a hearing Friday on whether it can continue detaining him during immigration proceedings.

Attorneys for Khalil said the memo proved the Trump administration was “targeting Mahmoud’s free speech rights about Palestine.”

“After a month of hiding the ball since Mahmoud’s late-night unjust arrest in New York and taking him away to a remote detention center in Louisiana, immigration authorities have finally admitted that they have no case whatsoever against him,” the attorneys, Marc Van Der Hout and Johnny Sinodis, said in a joint statement.

“There is not a single shred of proof that Mahmoud’s presence in America poses any threat,” they added.

A Department of Homeland Security spokesperson, Tricia McLaughlin, did not respond to questions about whether it had additional evidence against Khalil, writing in an emailed statement, “DHS did file evidence, but immigration court dockets are not available to the public.”

Khalil, a 30-year-old Palestinian by ethnicity who was born in Syria, was arrested March 8 in New York and taken to a detention center in Louisiana. He recently finished his coursework for a master's degree at Columbia’s school of international affairs. His wife, an American citizen, is due to give birth this month.

Khalil has adamantly rejected allegations of antisemitism, accusing the Trump administration in a letter sent from jail last month of “targeting me as part of a broader strategy to suppress dissent.”

“Knowing fully that this moment transcends my individual circumstances,” he added, “I hope nonetheless to be free to witness the birth of my first-born child.”

Though Rubio's memo references additional documents, including a “subject profile of Mahmoud Khalil” and letter from the Department Homeland Security, the government did not submit those documents to the immigration court, according to Khalil's lawyers.

The memo also calls for the deportation of a second lawful permanent resident, whose name is redacted in the filing.

The Trump administration has pulled billions of dollars in government funding from universities and their affiliated hospital systems in recent weeks as part of what it says is a campaign against antisemitism on college campuses, but which critics say is a crackdown on free speech. To get the money back, the administration has been telling universities to punish protesters and make other changes.

The U.S. government has also been revoking the visas of international students who criticized Israel or accused it of mistreating Palestinians.

At the time of Khalil's arrest, a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson accused Khalil of leading activities “aligned to Hamas,” referring to the militant group that attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.

But the government has not produced any evidence linking Khalil to Hamas, and made no reference to the group in their most recent filing.

Meanwhile, lawyers for Yunseo Chung, 21, another Columbia student and lawful U.S. resident whom the Department of Homeland Security seeks to deport, included the Rubio letter as an exhibit in court papers filed late Thursday in Manhattan federal court.

The lawyers asked a judge to let them obtain documents from the government related to the targeting of their client, including any that reference her by name related to the State Department’s decision to move to deport her.

Chung, who was arrested on a misdemeanor charge at a recent sit-in at Barnard College protesting the expulsion of students who participated in pro-Palestinian activism, has been ordered freed while her legal challenge is pending.