A federal judge ruled Secretary of State Marco Rubio can’t detain or remove Mahmoud Khalil from the United States for now.
In a June 11 ruling, District Judge Michael Farbiarz, of New Jersey, granted the 30-year-old Palestinian Columbia University graduate’s request to temporarily block federal officials from deporting him.
Khalil, who is a lawful permanent resident, has been held in a detention facility in Louisiana since he was detained in his university-owned New York City apartment building lobby in March. His lawyers have fought for his release to be with his wife and newborn son, Deen.
The Trump administration has said it stripped him of his legal status for his role in pro-Palestinian protests at the Ivy League campus in New York City.
Rubio had cited an obscure provision of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952. It allows the secretary of state to remove someone if there was reason to believe the person’s activities or presence in the country affect American foreign policy interests.
Farbiarz ruled against Rubio’s authority to remove Khalil, citing harm to Khalil’s career and reputation, and that it was chilling his right to speech. “This adds up to irreparable harm,” he said.
Neither the Justice Department nor the State Department immediately returned requests for comment. Khalil’s lawyers didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
The administration has also sought Khalil’s removal based on failure to accurately complete his residency application.
However, Farbiarz noted that “lawful permanent residents are virtually never detained pending removal for the sort of alleged omissions in a lawful-permanent-resident application that the Petitioner is charged with here.”
Mahmoud Khalil, 29, a graduate student at Columbia University, was notified by the school that he has been suspended. He stood outside the gates of the campus in Manhattan April 30, 2024.
Farbiarz said it was “overwhelmingly likely” that Khalil wouldn’t be detained solely on an application issue. Instead, Khalil’s detention “almost surely flows” from Rubio’s determination.
However, Farbiarz stayed his preliminary injunction until the morning of June 13, allowing the government time to appeal the case.
He also said the preliminary injunction wouldn’t go into effect until Khalil posts a nominal bond of $1.
Eduardo Cuevas is based in New York City. Reach him by email at emcuevas1@usatoday.com or on Signal at emcuevas.01.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Mahmoud Khalil can’t be held by Trump administration for now: judge