March 12 (UPI) — Lawyers for a Palestinian activist arrested by ICE at Columbia University are headed for court Wednesday to fight his potential deportation.
Federal authorities took Mahmoud Khalil into custody Saturday at his campus apartment and sent him to a detention center in Jena, La. Married to an American citizen, Khalil is a green card and student visa holder but his attorney Amy Greer said the State Department was working to revoke both.
His deportation was temporarily stopped by a federal judge Monday ahead of Wednesday’s hearing.
Khalil, a Palestinian refugee raised in Syria, was the lead student negotiator of an encampment at the Manhattan campus in 2024 when Columbia was the center of nationwide student protests held against the war in Gaza and American support for Israel.
The Trump administration announced Friday it was revoking $400 million in federal grants to Columbia University, alleging it failed to fight anti-Semitism on its campus. Columbia University confirmed Sunday that there have been reports of ICE around its grounds and said the university “has and will continue to follow the law.”
“We will be revoking the visas and/or green cards of Hamas supporters in America so they can be deported,” U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio posted to X Sunday.
President Trump posted on Truth Social Monday that Khalil’s arrest was the “first arrest of many to come” and that his administration will “find, apprehend, and deport” those considered “terrorist sympathizers.”
Although Khalil has been accused of making statements in support of Hamas, he has not been publicly accused of providing any material backing. His lawyers say he’s being punished for exercising his protected speech.
Khalil’s attorneys filed a petition Saturday for a writ of habeas corpus alleging that his arrest and detention based on his speech and activism violates the Due Process Clause and the First Amendment. The ACLU and NYCLU have since joined his legal team.
