US judge orders release of pro-Palestinian protest leader
A federal judge ordered the Trump administration on Friday to release Mahmoud Khalil, a Columbia University student who became a leader of pro-Palestinian campus protests.
Khalil, a legal permanent US resident who is married to a US citizen and has a US-born son, has been in custody since March facing potential deportation.
District Judge Michael Farbiarz ordered Khalil's release on bail during a hearing on Friday and he will be allowed to return to New York while his deportation case proceeds.
"After more than three months, we can finally breathe a sigh of relief and know that Mahmoud is on his way home," his wife, Michigan-born dentist Noor Abdalla, said in a statement.
"We know this ruling does not begin to address the injustices the Trump administration has brought upon our family and so many others the government is trying to silence for speaking out against Israel's ongoing genocide against Palestinians," added Abdalla, who gave birth to the couple's first child while her husband was in detention.
Amol Sinha, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey, which is among the groups representing Khalil, welcomed the release order.
"This is an important step in vindicating Mr Khalil's rights as he continues to be unlawfully targeted by the federal government for his advocacy in support of Palestinian rights," Sinha said. "We're confident he will ultimately prevail in the fight for his freedom."
Since his March 8 arrest by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, Khalil has become a symbol of President Donald Trump's campaign to stifle pro-Palestinian student activism against the Gaza war, in the name of curbing anti-Semitism.
At the time a graduate student at Columbia University in New York, Khalil was one of the most visible leaders of nationwide campus protests against Israel's war in Gaza.
Following his arrest, US authorities transferred Khalil, who was born in Syria to Palestinian parents, nearly 2,000 kilometers (1,242 miles) from his home in New York to a detention center in Louisiana, pending deportation.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio has invoked a law approved during the 1950s Red Scare that allows the United States to remove foreigners seen as adverse to US foreign policy.
Rubio argues that US constitutional protections of free speech do not apply to foreigners and that he alone can make decisions without judicial review.
Hundreds of students have seen their visas revoked, with some saying they were targeted for everything from writing opinion articles to minor arrest records.
Farbiarz ruled last week that the government could not detain or deport Khalil based on Rubio's assertions that his presence on US soil poses a national security threat.
The government has also alleged as grounds to detain and deport Khalil that there were inaccuracies in his application for permanent residency.
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