Going through a deadline from an immigration decide to turn over evidence for its attempted deportation of Columbia College activist Mahmoud Khalil, the federal authorities has as a substitute submitted a quick memo, signed by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, citing the Trump administration’s authority to expel noncitizens whose presence within the nation damages U.S. international coverage pursuits.
The two-page memo, which was obtained by The Related Press, doesn’t allege any felony conduct by Khalil, a legal permanent U.S. resident and graduate student who served as spokesperson for campus activists final yr throughout giant demonstrations towards Israel’s therapy of Palestinians and the warfare in Gaza.
Reasonably, Rubio wrote, Khalil might be expelled for his beliefs.
He stated that whereas Khalil’s actions have been “in any other case lawful,” letting him stay within the nation would undermine “U.S. coverage to fight anti-Semitism around the globe and in the USA, along with efforts to guard Jewish college students from harassment and violence in the USA.”
“Condoning anti-Semitic conduct and disruptive protests in the USA would severely undermine that vital international coverage goal,” Rubio wrote within the undated memo.
The submission was filed Wednesday after Choose Jamee Comans ordered the federal government to supply its proof towards Khalil forward of a listening to Friday on whether or not it will possibly proceed detaining him throughout immigration proceedings.
Attorneys for Khalil stated the memo proved the Trump administration was “concentrating on Mahmoud’s free speech rights about Palestine.”
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“After a month of hiding the ball since Mahmoud’s late-night unjust arrest in New York and taking him away to a distant detention heart in Louisiana, immigration authorities have lastly admitted that they don’t have any case by any means towards him,” the legal professionals, Marc Van Der Hout and Johnny Sinodis, stated in a joint assertion.
“There’s not a single shred of proof that Mahmoud’s presence in America poses any menace,” they added.
A Division of Homeland Safety spokesperson, Tricia McLaughlin, didn’t reply to questions on whether or not it had extra proof towards Khalil, writing in an emailed assertion, “DHS did file proof, however immigration court docket dockets aren’t accessible to the general public.”
Khalil, a 30-year-old Palestinian by ethnicity who was born in Syria, was arrested March 8 in New York and brought to a detention centre in Louisiana. He not too long ago completed his coursework for a grasp’s diploma at Columbia’s Faculty of Worldwide Affairs. His spouse, an American citizen, is because of give start this month.
Khalil has adamantly rejected allegations of antisemitism, accusing the Trump administration in a letter despatched from jail final month of “concentrating on me as a part of a broader technique to suppress dissent.”
“Realizing totally that this second transcends my particular person circumstances,” he added, “I hope nonetheless to be free to witness the start of my first-born baby.”
Although Rubio’s memo references extra paperwork, together with a “topic profile of Mahmoud Khalil” and letter from the Division Homeland Safety, the federal government didn’t submit these paperwork to the immigration court docket, in keeping with Khalil’s legal professionals.
The memo additionally requires the deportation of a second lawful everlasting resident, whose title is redacted within the submitting.
The Trump administration has pulled billions of {dollars} in authorities funding from universities and their affiliated hospital systems in latest weeks as a part of what it says is a marketing campaign towards antisemitism on school campuses, however which critics say is a crackdown on free speech. To get the cash again, the administration has been telling universities to punish protesters and make different modifications.
The U.S. authorities has additionally been revoking the visas of worldwide college students who criticized Israel or accused it of mistreating Palestinians.
On the time of Khalil’s arrest, a Division of Homeland Safety spokesperson accused Khalil of main actions “aligned to Hamas,” referring to the militant group that attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
However the authorities has not produced any proof linking Khalil to Hamas, and made no reference to the group of their most up-to-date filin
In the meantime, legal professionals for Yunseo Chung, 21, one other Columbia scholar and lawful U.S. resident whom the Division of Homeland Safety seeks to deport, included the Rubio letter as an exhibit in court docket papers filed late Thursday in Manhattan federal court docket.
The legal professionals requested a decide to allow them to get hold of paperwork from the federal government associated to the concentrating on of their shopper, together with any that reference her by title associated to the State Division’s resolution to maneuver to deport her.
Chung, who was arrested on a misdemeanor cost at a latest sit-in at Barnard Faculty protesting the expulsion of scholars who participated in pro-Palestinian activism, has been ordered freed whereas her authorized problem is pending.
© 2025 The Canadian Press
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