New York (QNN)- A federal appeals court on Thursday reversed a lower court decision that ordered the release of the former Columbia University graduate student and pro-Palestine activist Mahmoud Khalil from immigration detention, as part of Trump’s administration efforts to deport him.
The Philadelphia-based Third US Circuit Court of Appeals, in a 2-1 ruling, found that federal immigration law stripped the trial court of authority to consider Khalil’s challenge to his detention and ordered the case dismissed.
The ruling revived the possibility that Khalil could again be detained as the Trump administration pursues his deportation.
https://x.com/scotus_wire/status/2011816120114634913?s=46&t=t_-JFgpXqgMIkVsuBfWELw
Khalil is a permanent resident and recent Columbia University graduate who became a prominent figure in pro-Palestinian campus activism amid the Israeli genocide, helping to organize protests and encampments calling for a ceasefire and an end to US support for Israel.
His detention by the ICE last year at his department drew widespread criticism over the Trump administration’s crackdown on pro-Palestinian speech.
https://x.com/rbreich/status/2011499376175104256?s=46&t=t_-JFgpXqgMIkVsuBfWELw
The Trump administration claimed his presence threatened US foreign policy without providing evidence, but Judge Michael E. Farbiarz of the Federal District Court in Newark, New Jersey, ordered his release on bail in June and barred the government from detaining or deporting him.
Khalil accused the Trump administration of seeking to silence pro-Palestine voices by trying to re-detain him, after his attorneys appeared in October before the Third Circuit Court of Appeals to challenge the legality of his detention.
Khalil’s legal team asked judges to uphold lower court rulings that found the government’s actions likely unconstitutional and ordered his release on bail.
Khalil was the first in a wave of student protest leaders and international academics arrested under a Trump administration crackdown on pro-Palestine and anti-genocide activism.
While in detention, Khalil missed the birth of his first child.
