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The Trump administration argued that Khalil, a student from Columbia University, has not revealed past affiliations.
A federal judge of the United States allowed the administration of President Donald Trump to keep the student of students Mahmoud Khalil in detention according to allegations of immigration fraud.
On Friday, judge Michael Farbiarz of Newark, New Jersey, ruled that the Khalil legal team had not shown correctly why his detention for the accusation would be illegal.
It was a major setback for Khalil, who had been a negotiator For students demonstrators of the University of Columbia, demonstrate the War of Israel against Gaza. He was the first high-level demonstrator to be arrested as part of Trump’s campaign to expel foreign students who participated in the Pro-Palestinian plea.
This just week, Farbiarz seemed ready to order Khalil’s release, on the basis that his detention under the Immigration and Nationality Act in 1952 was unconstitutional.
This law stipulates that the Secretary of State – in this case, Marco Rubio – has the power to withdraw foreign nationals who have “early consequences of potentially serious foreign policy for the United States”. But Farbiarz judged that the use of the law by Rubio had violated Khalil’s freedom of expression.
However, the Trump administration filed other court documents saying that he had another reason to want to expel Khalil.
He alleged that Khalil, a permanent American resident, had omitted information from his request for a green card which would have otherwise disqualified him to obtain the residence.
The Trump administration has long accused Khalil of supporting terrorism thanks to his activities related to protest, which the former graduate student denied vehement.
In the case of his request for green cards, he argues that Khalil did not disclose his work with the United Nations agency for relief and works for refugees in Palestine in the Middle East (UNRWA), a humanitarian organization. Politicians in Israel and the United States accused an UNRWA of links with the armed group of Hamas, an allegation that would have been made unrelated.
Khalil, however, denied having been “officer” at UNRWA, as claims. Instead, his legal team underlines that he has completed a United Nations internship through Columbia University.
The Trump administration also maintains that Khalil did not precisely identify the duration of his job with the Syrian office of the British Embassy in Beirut. Khalil and his legal team, for their part, say that he precisely identified his date of departure of employment in December 2022.
Judge Farbiarz had set a deadline on Friday morning for the Trump administration to appeal from the liberation of Khalil on bail. But this deadline has been extended to give the government more time to challenge the release of Khalil.
In the end, Farbiarz allowed the Trump administration to continue its Khalil detention. He advised Khalil’s lawyers to request the liberation under bail from the immigration court where his expulsion trial is held in Louisiana.
Farbiarz had weighed a separate petition of Habeas Corpus from the Khalil team who questioned the constitutionality of his continuous detention.
Marc Van der Hout, lawyer for Khalil, told the reuters news agency that the accusations of immigration fraud were extremely rare, and that the use by Trump’s administration of these accusations was simply a political maneuver to keep Khalil in blocking.
“Hold someone on a charge like this is very unusual and frankly scandalous,” said Van der Hout. “There is not a constitutional basis for his detention.”
Another lawyer representing Khalil, Amy Greer, described the new allegations against her request for a green card as part of the “cruel and transparent delay tactics of the government”. She noted that Khalil, a new father whose child was born in April, is missing his first Fathers’ Day, which fell this Sunday in the United States.
“Instead of celebrating together, he languishes in ice [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] Detention as a punishment for his plea on behalf of his Palestinian colleagues, “Greer said in a statement.
“It’s unfair, it’s shocking and it’s shameful.”
