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OAN Staff James Meyers
4:20 PM – Friday, April 11, 2025
An immigration judge ruled on Friday that Columbia University’s anti-Israel protest leader, Mahmoud Khalil, who negotiated on behalf of pro-Palestine encampments, can be deported over his ties to the school’s previous “antisemitic protests and disruptive activities.”
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Khalil describes himself as a Palestinian activist and a Columbia University graduate student. He was born in a refugee camp in Damascus, Syria, in 1995 to Palestinian parents. He and his family fled to Lebanon in 2012 after the onset of the Syrian war.
In response to questions regarding the reasons behind activist Mahmoud Khalil’s arrest by immigration officials last month, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) released a two-page memo from Secretary of State Marco Rubio accusing the graduate student of taking part in “antisemitic protests and disruptive activities.”
The decision issued by the Louisiana immigration court was in response to the federal government’s efforts to deport the Syrian-born U.S. resident due to his pro-Hamas and anti-Israel activism at Columbia University.
Judge Jamee Comans said during the two-hour hearing on Friday that the feds had “established by clear and convincing evidence that [Khalil] is removable.”
Khalil asked to speak to the judge at the end of the hearing, according to his lawyers, arguing she had not given him “the due process and fundamental fairness.”
“Clearly what we witnessed today, neither of these principles were present today or in this whole process,” Khalil claimed.
“This is exactly why the Trump administration has sent me to this court, 1,000 miles away from my family,” he said. “I just hope that the urgency that you deemed fit for me are afforded to the hundreds of others who have been here without hearing for months.”
Khalil was transferred a day after his arrest to a facility in Jena, Louisiana, over a thousand miles away from his expectant wife.
Meanwhile, his lawyers have been fighting the arrest both in immigration court and in New Jersey federal court, where they filed a habeas corpus petition for his release on the grounds that the arrest violated his First Amendment right to free speech. They also argued that the government had targeted him.
ICE and the Department of Homeland Security invoked a law that allows the Secretary of State to deport noncitizens who potentially threaten U.S. foreign policy.
At the first hearing in Khalil’s immigration case Tuesday, Comans ordered the feds to provide her evidence supporting their bid to deport Khalil — so she could make her decision at the Friday hearing.
On Wednesday, the government filed the two-page memo from Secretary of State Marco Rubio arguing that Khalil should be kicked out of the country due to his participation “in antisemitic protests and disruptive activities, which fosters a hostile environment for Jewish students in the United States.”
Rubio’s memo said Khalil’s presence in the country undermines: “U.S. policy to combat antisemitism around the world and in the United States, in addition to efforts to protect Jewish students from harassment and violence in the United States.”
Khalil’s lawyer, Marc van der Hout, said in a statement: “Today, we saw our worst fears play out: Mahmoud was subject to a charade of due process, a flagrant violation of his right to a fair hearing, and a weaponization of immigration law to suppress dissent. This is not over, and our fight continues.”
Nevertheless, Khalil’s team was hoping that its New Jersey federal suit could offer a different option. The judge in that case, Michael Farbiarz, has already decided to block Khalil’s deportation while the case plays out.
Additionally, Farbiarz ordered Khalil and the feds to report for a phone conference on Friday afternoon to inform him of what took place in the immigration court.
Khalil was the main negotiator between Columbia United Apartheid Divest (CUAD), a group of radical student organizations that sympathizes with terror groups like Hamas and Hezbollah, and Columbia administrators during the encampment protests last year.
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