Mahmoud Khalil is a recent Columbia graduate student and U.S. green card holder who, in his own words, describes himself as a Palestinian political prisoner. The Trump administration snatched him from his home owned by Columbia and now wants to deport him, even though he is a legal permanent resident who is not, and has never been, accused of, charged with, or convicted of any crime. The NYCLU is part of a legal team representing Mr. Khalil that includes the ACLU, Amy Greer from Dratel & Lewis, the Center for Constitutional Rights, Alina Das at NYU, and CUNY CLEAR.
In a recent letter dictated by Mr. Khalil over the phone from ICE detention in Louisiana, he describes his arrest as “a direct consequence of exercising my right to free speech as I advocated for a free Palestine and an end to the genocide in Gaza.”
Mr. Khalil isn’t the only person the administration has in its sights. Trump’s Department of Homeland Security announced that a second Columbia student had been arrested while another student was targeted for deportation and was forced to flee the country.
The Trump administration’s actions represent a dangerous escalation of the president’s attempts to choke off the free speech rights of people on American soil. But Trump’s actions—and the unhinged legal theories that underpin them—take place in the broader context of an anti-free speech fire that Trump is now dousing with gasoline.
Paper-Thin Pretext
In his Truth Social post boasting about Mr. Khalil’s arrest, Trump said his administration’s actions were in line with his recently signed executive order, which promised to take “all criminal and civil authorities and actions available …” to “investigate and punish anti-Jewish racism in leftist, anti-American colleges and universities.”
Trump is part of a broad swath of politicians who have increasingly equated any criticism of Israel or the Israeli government with antisemitism. This is a false equivalency. Just ask the Jewish protesters who risked arrest to occupy Trump Tower and call for Mr. Khalil to be freed.
But even if a person in the United States were to make antisemitic comments—as reprehensible as antisemitism is—that would not be legal grounds for removing someone from the country. The Constitution’s right to free speech covers everyone in the United States, regardless of their citizenship status.
In its attempt to get around these protections, the Trump administration is relying on an obscure, rarely used, provision of the Immigration and Nationality Act that says any “alien whose presence or activities in the United States the secretary of state has reasonable ground to believe would have potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States is deportable.”
The administration is clearly weaponizing false charges of antisemitism to punish Mr. Khalil for his expression. Anyone confused about what Mr. Khalil’s actual expression is should read his recent letter, where he explains, “I have always believed that my duty is not only to liberate myself from the oppressor, but also to liberate my oppressors from their hatred and fear.”
If judges allow this to stand, it will give the Trump administration—and all future administrations—sweeping power to deport millions of people whose opinions they disagree with or find objectionable.
No president can arrest, detain, or deport anyone for disagreeing with the government. The Trump administration has selectively targeted Mr. Khalil to show just how far Trump and his cabinet will go to crack down on dissent. We live in a country where, despite all its flaws, ideas are not illegal and where dissent cannot be grounds for the president to deport someone.
Trump’s actions have been applauded by many Republicans, which is a bit rich considering conservatives spent years complaining that college students were precious snowflakes who couldn’t handle arguments that made them uncomfortable. Now many of them think people they disagree with should be kicked out of the country.
Speech-Stifling Atmosphere
Mr. Khalil’s arrest came just days after the Trump administration pulled $400 million in federal funding from Columbia for allegedly failing to stamp out antisemitism on its campus. The administration then sent Columbia a ransom note with a list of demands the university must agree to in order to have any hope of getting the money back. Unsurprisingly, one of Trump’s demands is that the university adopt a definition of antisemitism that falsely equates criticism of Israel or the Israeli government with antisemitism.
The administration equates all advocacy on behalf of Palestine and Palestinian people with terrorism and antisemitism. We’ve seen this formulation time and time again in which Palestinians, or those who advocate for Palestinian rights, are seen as inherently dangerous. This is a classic example of anti-Palestinian racism.
And despite what the Trump administration says, Columbia has aggressively suppressed students advocating for Palestinian rights—whether they are protesting, speaking out, or simply hanging a Palestine flag outside their dorm room. The school expelled, suspended and in some cases temporarily revoked the degrees of some students who participated in occupying Hamilton Hall last year.
Columbia also called in the NYPD to retake Hamilton Hall in an operation that looked like a military raid and during which an NYPD officer fired his gun inside the building. And in March of last year, the NYCLU and Palestine Legal sued Columbia for the school’s unlawful suspension of its chapters of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) and Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) for engaging in peaceful protest.
Just next door, Columbia’s partner school, Barnard College, expelled several students for non-violent pro-Palestine protests in February. Around the same time, NYU suspended 13 students for the same reason.
The list goes on and on. It isn’t limited to punishments for students and faculty. Last month, Gov. Kathy Hochul ordered the City University of New York to immediately remove a job posting for a Palestinian Studies professor within Hunter College’s social sciences department.
In its effort to bully Columbia, the administration has demanded it impose a mask ban as one of the conditions to get the $400 million in federal grants back. But Trump is far from the only politician who wants to criminalize protesters for wearing face coverings. New York politicians on both sides of the aisle, including Gov. Hochul and New York City Mayor Eric Adams, support mask bans.
Criminalizing masks seriously undermines protections for people who want to engage in anonymous political protests. Mr. Khalil’s case makes the dangers for people who protest without them clear.
There is a huge difference in severity between pushing for a mask ban and doing what the Trump administration has done to Mr. Khalil. But a mask ban and the constant repression of speech by universities contribute to a climate of repression in which Trump has radically ratcheted up the threats to people’s right to protest.
As we’ve seen from the cuts Elon Musk and DOGE have inflicted, the Trump administration will try to dismantle colleges and universities whether they crackdown on students’ speech or not. There is no appeasing an administration that wants to destroy or radically transform higher education.
None of this is to say that antisemitism isn’t a very real and serious problem. In fact, many in Trump’s orbit have trafficked in it. But New York politicians should not contribute to the speech-chilling atmosphere by pushing for measures that stifle dissent and feed into pervasive and discriminatory stereotypes about Palestinians. That won’t curtail antisemitism, and it plays right into Trump’s hands.
State leaders should also join the calls to free Mr. Khalil so he can be with his family in New York, where he belongs.
Simon McCormack Senior Writer, Communications & Veronica Salama Staff Attorney, Legal are with the NY Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU)
Free speech is fine. Criticizing Israel is fine. Even insulting Jews or Palestinians is fine, though you might get punched. What isn’t OK is covering your face (without a medical or religious exemption ha ha), blocking buildings, harming employees, taking over buildings, etc.