A federal judge in Manhattan judged that anti-Israeli agitator Mahmoud Khalil must not be deported ‘unless and until the court is otherwise’ on Monday.
Khalil, who led anti-Israeli protests and camps on the Campus of Columbia University, was taken into custody on Saturday at the Upper West Side in New York City. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said that he was a former graduate student in Columbia who led activities that led to Hamas, a designated terrorist organization. ”
The judge ordered a hearing for Wednesday. This after Khalil’s lawyer argued that their client had been held illegally and had to be released.
Politicians have also expressed themselves in the defense of Khalil. “Squad” Member Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., Criticized his arrest and called the incident a “gross violation of constitutional rights.”
Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., His concern about anti-Israeli activist Mahmoud Khalil, who was arrested by ICE agents on 8 March. (Getty images / pool)
In a post published to Instagram on Sunday, Tlaib wrote that it was “dangerous to allow our government to focus people on the basis of political speech” and warned that “more targeting of students like this will happen.”
“Everyone should worry about this,” Tlaib said in the Instagram video.
Michigan’s Congressman also addressed the reports about Khalil that a student visa had withdrawn after his lawyer said he was a legal permanent resident.
“They moved in his student visa, well, guess? He doesn’t have a student visa,” Tlaib claimed. “He is a green card holder. Legal permanent resident.”
“Now, again, they continue to involve the lawyer … he or she asked for an order, they hung up on them,” she continued. “If you believe in constitutional rights, you understand that they are focusing on this person. And everyone knows that he has been very vocal against the genocide of the Palestinian people in Gaza, and they focus on him and refuse him constitutional rights. Who is the next?”
In an X post on Monday, the Attorney General Letitia James of New York repeated the concern of Tlaib.
File -Student negotiator Mahmoud Khalil is at the Columbia University Campus in New York on a Pro -Palestinian protest camp on April 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Ted Shaffrey, File)
“I am very worried about the arrest and detention of Mahmoud Khalil, a lawyer and legal permanent resident of Palestinian descent,” Las James “Post. “My office keeps an eye on the situation and we have contact with his lawyer.”
The lawyer of Khalil, Amy E. Greer, has released a statement that claimed that her client was “wrongly arrested.”
“Last night Ice Agents wrongly arrested Mahmoud Khalil, claiming that his student visa was withdrawn – although Mahmoud is legal permanent resident (green card) and not in the US on a student visa,” was the statement of the Sunday of Greer. “With that fact, the ice officers held him anyway.”
President Donald Trump, However, said that Khalil’s fear “the first arrest of many” was in a recent post on social media.
“We know that there are more students in Columbia and other universities throughout the country who deal with pro-terrorist, anti-Semitic, anti-American activity, and the Trump government will not tolerate it,” Trump said in a social post.
Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., And Union activists discuss the free speech at university campuses, in the Capitol in Washington, Thursday 23 May 2024. (AP Photo / J. Scott Applewhite)
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“Many are not students, they are paid agitators,” he added. “We will find, purchase and deport these terrorist sympathizers from our country – to never return.”
FOX News Digital reached Tlaaib’s office for extra comments.
According to Ice, Khalil is held in the Lasalle detention facility in Louisiana.
Pilar Arias from Fox News Digital has contributed to this report.
