Lawyers challenge customs officials' constitutional authority to deport Brown Medicine kidney doctor
Demonstrators gathered outside of the Rhode Island State House to protest the deportation of Brown Medicine kidney doctor Rasha Alawieh on March 17, 2025 in Providence. (Photo by)
Attorneys for Dr. Rasha Alawieh, a Brown Medicine kidney doctor deported to her native Lebanon in mid-March, continue to fight to bring her back.
An amended complaint filed in U.S. District Court in Massachusetts Monday contends that the U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers who refused entry to Alawieh at Boston Logan International Airport lacked the constitutional authority to deport her back to Lebanon. The amended complaint, unavailable electronically due to federal court rules limiting public access to in immigration cases, was shared by Alawieh's attorneys Tuesday.
'The Constitution requires that federal officials with significant power over people's lives be appointed by the President or Department heads, to ensure oversight and accountability for their actions,' Golnaz Fakhimi, legal director of Muslim Advocates, which is co-representing Alawieh in the case, said in a statement. 'For Dr. Alawieh, a visibly Muslim woman, the government has thumbed its nose at these Constitutional requirements.'
Cambridge, Massachusetts-based immigration law firm Marzouk Law LLC is also representing Alawieh in the deportation case.
Alawieh, 34, was stopped by federal immigration authorities at Boston Logan International Airport on March 13 while heading back to Rhode Island after securing a coveted H-1B work visa from the U.S. Embassy in her native Beirut, according to court documents. An emergency petition filed by her cousin a day later sought to stop Alawieh from being deported from the airport, but Alawieh was already on a flight to Paris by the time the judge's emergency order was received by customs officials.
Her abrupt deportation drew a mass protest outside the Rhode Island State House days later, but there has been little public outcry in the nearly two months since she was sent back to Lebanon. An initial hearing scheduled before U.S. District Court Judge Leo Sorokin on March 17 was canceled due to changes in Alawieh's legal representation.
The updated complaint asks U.S. District Court Judge Leo Sorokin to declare Alawieh's removal order unlawful, reinstate her H-1B work visa, and allow for removal proceedings before a federal immigration judge.
'For Dr. Alawieh — someone with over six-and-a-half years of lawful presence and ties to the United States, seeking to return from brief travel abroad — due process requires the opportunity to be heard by an immigration judge,' her lawyers said in a statement.
Ryan Brissette, a spokesperson for U.S. Customs and Border Protection, declined to comment on the updated complaint Tuesday, saying the agency does not comment on pending litigation.
Airport customs officials found photos of various Hezbollah leaders on Alawieh's phone, according to court documents filed by the federal administration. Excerpts from the filings were shared on social media by U.S. Homeland Security. She also told customs officials when questioned that she attended a funeral event for the Islamist group's late leader, Hassan Nasrallah, the administration alleged.
The stadium event held in Beirut on Feb. 23 drew hundreds of thousands of attendees.
Constitutional authority versus politics
Alawieh's lawyers acknowledged but gave little credence to Alawieh's religious and political beliefs as they pertain to her deportation. Instead, the updated complaint centers on whether customs officials had the power to decide whether she was allowed to enter the country or not.
'The claims in this case do not concern the questioning,' the amended complaint states. 'This case turns on whether the role and authority of CPB officers and the procedures they applied to their engagement with Dr. Alawieh violated the requirements of the Constitution.'
The three federal customs officers stationed at Logan, two of whom are identified by last name only in the amended complaint, were not directly appointed by the president or Congress. Therefore, they lack authority to deport her — violating the Appointments Clause of the U.S. Constitution, the lawsuit states.
'For well over a century the Supreme Court has made clear that the power 'to forbid the entrance of foreigners within its dominions, or to admit them only in such cases and upon such conditions as it may see fit to prescribe' is a sovereign responsibility, the 'final determination' of which is entrusted to 'executive officers,'' the complaint states. 'The unchecked devolution of this power to unappointed employees cannot be squared with the Appointments Clause.'
The lawsuit also identifies as defendants the anonymous Boston field office director for the U.S. Customs and Border Protection; Peter Flores, acting commissioner for U.S. Customs and Border Protection; U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem; and U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi.
Alawieh is among a growing number of immigrants, including some U.S. citizens and other visa holders, who have been detained and deported since Trump took office. Her case drew public interest in part due to her medical training — Alawieh is one of three transplant nephrologists in Rhode Island, providing life-saving care to patients who now have no doctor, the lawsuit contends.
Court documents reveal the Lebanese doctor had been working and studying in the United States since 2018. After finishing her residency at the American University of Beirut, Alawieh completed a series of fellowships in nephrology at Ohio State University, University of Washington and, most recently, Yale University.
In June 2024, she was offered an assistant professorship through Brown Medicine Inc.'s Division of Nephrology. The nonprofit, physician-led practice, which is affiliated with the Brown University Warren Alpert School of Medicine, offered to sponsor Alawieh's H-1B visa for the job. While her petition for the specialty work visa was approved in June 2024, she was not able to obtain the visa itself from the U.S. Embassy in Beirut until March of this year — the purpose of her visit home.
In addition to her job at Brown Medicine, the nonprofit, physician-led practice, which is affiliated with the Brown University Warren Alpert School of Medicine, Alawieh also had a clinical fellowship at Brown University, and consulted on cases out of Rhode Island Hospital, which is owned by Brown University Health.
'Doctors, no matter where they're from, are an integral part of our communities,' Dr. Daniel Walden, a resident physician at Brown University who helped launch a petition to bring Dr. Alawieh back home, said in a statement Tuesday. 'Dr. Alawieh is a compassionate healthcare professional who provides much-needed care to our community. She has stood by her patients, her community, and her colleagues, and it's our turn to stand up for her. We urge the prompt return of Dr. Alawieh so she can continue providing crucial healthcare to Rhode Island.'
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