Category World News

Alexandria, Virginia – “Free him now. Free him now.”

Those words rang outside a federal courthouse near Washington, DC, on Thursday, as lawyers argued over the case of Badar Khan Suri, who has been detained by the United States government over his support for Palestinian rights.

Dozens of activists had gathered to show solidarity with Khan Suri, a postdoctoral scholar at Georgetown University. He was arrested in March as part of President Donald Trump’s campaign to punish and deport non-citizens accused of fuelling “anti-Semitism” and “illegal protests” on college campuses.

Speaking to the crowd in Alexandria, Virginia, Mapheze Saleh – Khan Suri’s Palestinian American wife – highlighted the impact of his detention on their three children. She said they just wanted their father back.

“Why is this happening to him? Why is the Trump administration persecuting him?” Saleh said. “Because he fell in love and married to a Palestinian, because he dared to express his belief in non-violence and because he spoke out bravely against the genocide of my people in Gaza.”

Before his detention, Khan Suri was in the US on an academic visa, conducting research on peace-building in Iraq and Afghanistan.

But the US government has accused Khan Suri, an Indian national, of violating the terms of his visa by “actively spreading Hamas propaganda and promoting antisemitism on social media”. It has not offered proof of either assertion.

Outside the courthouse on Thursday, Amanda Eisenhour, an activist from Alexandria, said Khan Suri’s case represents the intersection of issues including free speech, constitutional rights and the “tyranny” of the US immigration system.

“It’s also about Palestine,” Eisenhour told Al Jazeera. “I want to make sure that’s always part of the conversation. Dr Khan Suri is a political prisoner because of his association, because of his marriage to somebody who’s Palestinian. We’re now a country that holds political prisoners, and we have to be ready to fight against that.”

As the legal hearing unfolded, activists outside chanted for Khan Suri’s freedom and Palestinian rights under a statue of a blindfolded woman holding scales, symbolising justice without bias.

One protester held up a sign, “Mob bosses disappear people.” Another placard proclaimed, “Due process now.”

A case in Virginia, a client in Texas

In the courtroom, lawyers for both sides questioned the geographical divide between where the hearing was taking place – and where Khan Suri is held presently.

After his arrest in Virginia, immigration officials quickly moved Khan Suri from a local detention centre to one in Louisiana and then in Texas.

Critics say the government has transferred individuals slated for deportation to faraway states to keep them away from their families and legal teams. They also point out that states like Louisiana and Texas are more likely to have conservative-leaning courts.

On Thursday, Khan Suri’s lawyers argued for the scholar to be moved back to his home state of Virginia, where his case is currently unfolding.

“We hope the court sees through these unlawful government tactics, keeps Dr Suri’s case here in Virginia, orders that he be released or, at minimum, orders that he be returned to Virginia, where he’ll be close to his legal counsel and to his family,” said Samah Sisay, staff lawyer at the Center for Constitutional Rights, which is involved in the case.

But the Trump administration made an opposing request, pushing for the court case to be transferred to Texas.

Ultimately, Judge Patricia Tolliver Giles demanded answers about why Khan Suri was moved so swiftly out of Virginia. She gave the government’s lawyers 24 hours to respond.

The Georgetown scholar’s lawyers have reason to be optimistic about the outcome. Federal district courts have asserted jurisdiction in similar cases, and on Wednesday, a judge in Vermont ordered the release of Columbia University student Mohsen Mahdawi, who is also facing deportation.

‘That’s not the America we want to be’

Since Trump began his second term in January, Secretary of State Marco Rubio has suggested that he revoked the visas of hundreds of foreign students who engaged in protests or criticism of Israel.

But the push to deport Khan Suri has been one of the most prominent cases.

To justify removing Khan Suri and other student activists, Rubio has cited the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952, a Cold War-era law. One rarely used provision allows the secretary of state to deport non-citizens who pose “potentially serious adverse foreign consequences” for the US.

The Trump administration has not charged Khan Suri with a crime. But officials have accused him of “connections to a known or suspected terrorist”: his father-in-law.

“Suri was married to the daughter of a senior advisor for to [sic] Hamas terrorist group,” the Department of Homeland Security said in a social media post.

But Khan Suri’s supporters point out that his father-in-law, Ahmed Yousef, has not been associated with Hamas for years and has even criticised the group on multiple occasions.

Yousef had served more than a decade ago as an adviser to former Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, a Hamas leader who was killed by Israel in Iran last year.

Regardless, legal experts say familial ties are not a criminal offence or grounds for deportation.

Hassan Ahmad, a Virginia-based lawyer representing Khan Suri, said the allegation about the Georgetown scholar’s father-in-law sets the case apart from the push to deport other pro-Palestine students.

“We’re talking not just about the First Amendment, freedom of speech. We’re talking about the constitutional freedom of association as well,” Ahmad said.

“And that’s something that distinguishes Dr Suri’s case, in that here they’re going after him based on not anything that he said or retweeted or forwarded or liked or spoke to anyone [about], but based only on his association. That’s not the America we want to be.”

Eden Heilman, the legal director for the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Virginia, which is helping to represent Khan Suri, also said deporting someone based on their personal connections is a “very scary premise”.

“If that’s what the government has done, which they are alleging they are doing with Dr Suri, we are in an unprecedented time in terms of our constitutional threats,” Heilman told reporters on Thursday.

Moreover, social media accounts that appear to belong to Khan Suri do not show any direct support for Hamas or hostility towards the Jewish people. Instead, the scholar has used his social media presence to decry Israeli atrocities in Gaza and highlight apparent war crimes against Palestinians.

“Israel is bombing hospitals in Gaza to turn the land inhabitable, in order to build the case for making Palestinians in Gaza think of migrating to the Sinai desert,” Khan Suri wrote in October 2023.

In recent months, Trump has called for the removal of all Palestinians from Gaza, a plan that rights advocates say amounts to ethnic cleansing.

A ‘Kafkaesque’ situation

Democratic Congressman Don Beyer, who represents a district in northern Virginia where Khan Suri lived, attended Thursday’s hearing to show support.

“I’ll be doing everything I can to help Dr Khan [Suri] and his family, and I encourage each one of us to do all that we can to tell these stories, to help educate the American people about what’s happening in this threat to our Constitution, to our rights,” Beyer said in a video message on Thursday.

“It is Kafkaesque that somebody can be kidnapped without reason, without acknowledgement, without logic, without charges and taken off to be locked in a prison in Texas, not knowing what happens next.”

Anita Martineau, a Northern Virginia resident, told Al Jazeera people should not be “kidnapped” for their speech. She attended a protest outside the hearing, holding a poster that read, “Bring Khan Suri back now.”

“It’s absolutely unconstitutional, and it needs to stop,” Martineau said. “American people and anyone in this country, whether they’re citizens or residents, they all need to stand up. We need to speak with one voice.”

Melissa Petisa, an activist with the group Alexandria for Palestinian Human Rights, also called for Khan Suri to be “released immediately”. She added that Trump is targeting students as a tactic to distract from the escalating carnage in Gaza.

A judge in the United States has quashed President Donald Trump’s administration’s ability to deport Venezuelans from South Texas in violation of the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 (AEA).

The decision on Thursday is the first of its kind, and it is likely to face a swift appeal.

As Trump seeks to remove undocumented immigrants from the country quickly, it follows similar, if temporary, orders barring the government from using the law.

Judge Fernando Rodriguez Jr., a judge in the US District Court, ruled that the Trump administration had “exceeded the statutory boundaries” of the Alien Enemies Act, a wartime law.

On March 15, Trump signed an executive order to impose sanctions on Tren de Aragua members of Venezuela. He argued that Tren de Aragua was “propagandizing an invasion of and predatory incursion into the United States,” which supported such extreme measures.

After all, only three times before, most recently during World War II, were the Alien Enemies Act invoked.

However, Judge Rodriguez acknowledged that the gang engaged in behavior that “unambiguously is harmful to society” and that the threat of Tren de Aragua fell far short of the requirements for the Alien Enemies Act.

The judge wrote, “The Court concludes that Tren de Aragua’s activities do not fall within the plain, common definition of an invasion or a predatory incursion” in the context of the AEA.”

The Court rules that the President’s proclamation of the AEA goes beyond the meaning of the statute and is thus unlawful.

Judge Rodriguez ruled that the Trump administration could not “use the law” to “detain Venezuelan aliens, transfer them within the United States, or remove them from the country because they “did not possess the lawful authority under the AEA.”

Judge Rodriguez was appointed by Trump and served in his current capacity as a Republican leader in 2018. His decision affects Houston and the Southern District of Texas.

Although it is the most significant ruling of its kind, it also joins a number of court and legal decisions that evaluate the Trump administration’s use of Alien Enemies Act.

In times of war or invasion, the US government is authorized to detain and deport citizens of allies. However, its use has been highly polarized, with some calling it constitutional.

During World War II, the Alien Enemies Act was used as justification for the imprisonment of tens of thousands of Japanese Americans and other foreign nationals in camps. After the incident, decades later, the US officially apologized and offered compensation to Japanese American survivors.

The Alien Enemies Act is alleged to have been used by Trump as the first president to do so outside of combat. He has attempted to portray undocumented immigration to the US as an unchecked “invasion” of criminals who threaten US communities with violence by using nativist rhetoric.

Since taking office for a second term, Trump has labeled criminal organizations like Tren de Aragua as international terrorist organizations, making non-citizen members unadmissible in the US.

However, the Supreme Court has ruled (PDF) that foreigners have a right to judicial review of their cases when they are removed under the Alien Enemies Act.

Lower courts have also questioned whether the Trump administration’s use of the Alien Enemies Act violated that right to free speech.

Judges in Colorado, Manhattan, and Pennsylvania have temporarily enjoined the use of the law, and Judge James Boasberg in Washington, DC, has been in charge of a well-known case in which three planes deported from El Salvador were detained under the law despite an injunction against its use.

Boasberg ruled in favor of the Trump administration’s breach of his order last month, finding it to be “probable cause.” Boasberg has continued to face allegations in that case, but Trump and his allies claim that by interfering with foreign policy, he has overstepped his legal authority.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) applauded Judge Rodriguez’s decision on Thursday after being one of the plaintiffs who have filed lawsuits against the Alien Enemies Act’s use in court.

According to a statement from ACLU lawyer Lee Gelernt, the president can’t unilaterally invade the United States and invoke a wartime authority during peacetime. This 18th-century wartime law should never be used, according to Congress.

The ACLU’s Texas branch’s legal director Adriana Pinon also hailed the decision as a victory for immigrant rights.

“This permanent injunction is a significant win for preventing unlawful, unilateral executive action that has been stoking fear in Texas, especially within border communities,” she said.

“This state and nation are a largely a part of them,” said Immigrants, who have always been that way. Both US Constitution and US laws protect them.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer also voiced his opposition, calling Trump’s use of the Alien Enemies Act unlawful.

Schumer wrote on social media that the Trump administration is “attempting to deport people without due process” and that it is “patently breaking the law.” Americans reject this, they say. They are being held accountable by the courts. We will continue to fight for our Constitution.

Millions of people are still at risk of starving because of crises.

Since Donald Trump’s election as president of the United States in January, civil liberties have been threatened. Because US law does not give them the same protections as US citizens, the Trump administration has primarily targeted more vulnerable groups, including immigrants, tourists, and non-American activists.

Some immigrants and tourists have been stranded for a while at the border. They have been detained in some cases because of Trump-related social media posts. What should a person be prepared for when they encounter US immigration agents, according to the question?

Entry points

Trump’s crackdown targets people at risk when they cross the US border.

Rasha Alawieh, a Lebanese physician and assistant professor at Brown University, was detained by US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) as she attempted to re-enter the country in March, and she was eventually deported after agents allegedly found Hezbollah-related photos on her phone. She tried to explain to the organization before being eventually sent to Lebanon that she had no idea she was associated with the paramilitary group and that she did not.

Because Customs and Border Protection has more authority than regular law enforcement, according to Tom Bowman, policy counsel at the Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT). He claims that they are permitted to search people’s electronic devices “without a warrant or probable cause.”

They cannot refuse you entry to the country if you are a citizen because they won’t let you unlock your phone. According to Bill Budington, a senior staff technologist at the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), they may seize the phone, but they can’t prevent you from entering. “It might be wise to comply with any requests made by customers and border enforcement if you are at risk of deportation, but that doesn’t mean you can’t reduce the amount of data you’re carrying with you.”

According to Bowman, “some travelers choose to restrict the data they can bring across the border.” “That might involve using a travel-only device, deleting sensitive apps and files entirely, and storing important information in the cloud and logging out of all accounts.” People use full-disk encryption to protect their contents before attempting to cross the border and shut down devices completely.

Students who support Palestine have been targeted by the ICE, and it frequently uses social media to do so.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) apprehended Georgetown University postdoctoral fellow Badar Khan Suri in March as he returned home after performing a Ramadan iftar. Suri’s lawyers claimed that Suri, who was born in India and was on a student visa while residing in the US, was “spreading Hamas propaganda and promoting antisemitism on social media,” which he denied.

US Citizenship and Immigration Services had previously announced that it would check the social media accounts of people who were applying for permanent residency and those who were affiliated with educational institutions for “antisemitic activity.”

punishing protest

The Trump administration is currently punishing those who protest, including non-citizens, even though it has not yet invoked the Insurrection Act.

One of the many instances of similar cases is the administration’s recent efforts to deport a student activist named Mahmoud Khalil from Columbia University because of his involvement in pro-Palestinian protests.

Daniel Solove, a professor of intellectual property and technology law at George Washington University, says, “I think people should be very concerned.” The government can use facial recognition and AI-assisted surveillance to systematically identify and track protesters because “we live in a surveillance society.” The government is already pursuing protesters, according to reports.

Momodou Taal, a student and activist at Cornell University, recently revoked his student visa to avoid deportation. ICE has also targeted Yonseo Chung, a student, activist, and legal permanent resident who immigrated from South Korea at the age of 7.

According to Bowman, federal agents may use geolocation, facial recognition, social media, and video surveillance to track protesters. He claims that people who use photos and videos to document protests can unintentionally identify those who attended a particular demonstration. This makes it important to be watchful when using their devices.

When traveling to a protest, turning your phone into airplane mode is one of the most basic protection. You won’t send your data in real time, Budington says. With offline maps, you can still navigate streets. Apple Maps and Google Maps both have methods for doing that.

Because of the encryption that comes with using messaging apps like Signal during protests, protesters can also communicate via SMS. Some people advise leaving your phone at home alone, but you might want it if you need to keep track of wrongful police actions in case of an emergency.

People who enter the country or attend protests can take steps to lessen the risk of them being targeted by the government, though it is essentially impossible to prevent all government snooping and keep one’s data completely secure 100% of the time.

Americans are increasingly aware of their need for privacy and are looking for ways to safeguard themselves. According to Buddington, people now seem much more concerned with privacy than they did ten or five years ago.