The Rationale for Deporting Mahmoud Khalil Is Alarmingly Vague and Broad
Mahmoud Khalil, the first target of President Donald Trump’s crusade against international students he describes as “terrorist sympathizers,” was released from custody on Friday after more than three months of detention. But the Trump administration is still trying to deport Khalil, a legal permanent resident, based on his participation in anti-Israel protests at Columbia University.
The official rationale for expelling Khalil is that he poses a threat to U.S. foreign policy interests. That justification is alarmingly broad and vague, raising due process and free speech concerns that interact with each other.
Khalil, a former Columbia graduate student, was arrested in Manhattan on March 8 and sent to an immigration detention facility in Louisiana. His arrest was based on 8 USC 1227, which authorizes the removal of noncitizens when the secretary of state “has reasonable ground to believe” their “presence or activities” in this country “would have potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States.”
In a two-page memo invoking Section 1227, Secretary of State Marco Rubio claimed Khalil had participated in “antisemitic protests” that “foster[ed] a hostile environment for Jewish students.” Those activities, Rubio averred, “undermine U.S. policy to combat anti-Semitism around the world and in the United States” as well as “efforts to protect Jewish students from harassment and violence in the United States.”
Rubio added that “condoning anti-Semitic conduct and disruptive protests in the United States would severely undermine” a “significant foreign policy objective.” He nebulously described that objective as “champion[ing] core Ame
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