Trump-Appointed Judges Block Release of Pro-Palestine Protester from ICE Custody
A federal appeals court panel, consisting of one George W. Bush appointee and two Donald Trump appointees, overturned a lower court ruling that had freed Columbia University student and pro-Palestinian activist Mohsen Mahdawi from ICE detention. The Second Circuit panel ruled that the Vermont federal judge who ordered Mahdawi's release in 2025 lacked jurisdiction, arguing that only an immigration court could handle his detention challenge as it was tied to his deportation case. Mahdawi, a Palestinian refugee from the West Bank, was arrested by masked agents during a scheduled citizenship interview in April 2025, which he described as a 'trap.' Secretary of State Marco Rubio had pushed for his deportation, claiming Mahdawi's advocacy could undermine U.S. foreign policy. Mahdawi co-founded Columbia's Palestinian Student Union with Mahmoud Khalil, another permanent resident detained by ICE. Mahdawi's statement, released by the ACLU, condemned the ruling as a political failure that weakens First Amendment protections for non-citizens.
Editorial responsibility
- No named human review is recorded for this page.
- Reports are grouped by semantic similarity and deterministic rules. Language models may assist titles, summaries, translation and cross-source analysis; the page itself is projected from evidence records.
- Current automated evidence projection