Nationwide protests are planned this weekend after Mahmoud Khalil, a former Columbia University student activist, was arrested by immigration authorities, fueling tensions between the Trump administration and student movements over immigration policy.
Khalil, 30, was taken into custody by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in the middle of the night last weekend, prompting outrage in recent days. Khalil, an Algerian citizen of Palestinian descent, helped lead pro-Palestinian demonstrations at Columbia University last spring.
Protests calling for his release will be held in cities including New York City, Boston, Phoenix, Charlotte, Oklahoma City, Miami and Indianapolis on Saturday and Sunday.
Several dozen protestors gathered in Times Square on Saturday afternoon, wearing traditional Palestinian scarfs, known as kuffiyehs, and waving Palestinian flags.
“Release Mahmoud right now!” the protestors shouted.
Grant Miner, the former president of a union representing thousands of Columbia student workers who were fired and expelled this week, addressed the crowd. He described Mahmoud’s detention as “a campaign of fear.”
“We must stand up together to tell Trump and his billionaire buddies that we’re not going to stand for this intimidation and the backsliding of civil rights in this country,” he said.
To justify Khalil’s arrest, the Trump administration cited an obscure foreign-policy clause that allows the federal government to deport foreign nationals whom it deems national security threats. The Department of Homeland Security alleges that Khalil “led activities aligned to Hamas, a designated terrorist organization.”
On Monday, a federal judge temporarily blocked the Trump administration from expelling Khalil, a legal permanent resident, from the country as he challenges his deportation.
Khalil filed an amended petition and complaint in federal district court in Manhattan on Thursday, stating he was the target of “retaliatory detention and attempted removal of a student protestor because of his constitutionally protected speech.” Khalil finished his classes at Columbia in December 2024 and was expected to graduate in the spring, according to the filing.
Immigration authorities are holding the 30-year-old in Louisiana and his lawyers have petitioned for him to be returned to New York City. His wife, an American, is eight months pregnant.
“I urge you to see Mahmoud through my eyes as a loving husband and the future father to our baby,” she said in a statement through Khalil’s defense counsel on Monday. “I need your help to bring Mahmoud home, so he is here beside me, holding my hand in the delivery room as we welcome our first child into this world.”
Trump administration targets campus protesters
Khalil’s arrest marks the first attempt to fulfill President Donald Trump’s campaign pledge to deport international students who protested in support of Palestinians on campuses across the country last spring.
On Tuesday, a doctoral student from India whom DHS accused of supporting Hamas self-deported to Canada. And on Friday, another Palestinian student who took part in Columbia’s protests last year, identified by DHS as Leqaa Kordia, was arrested for allegedly overstaying her student visa.
“It is a privilege to be granted a visa to live and study in the United States of America,” DHS Secretary Kristi Noem said in a statement on Friday. “When you advocate for violence and terrorism that privilege should be revoked, and you should not be in this country.”
DHS agents also raided two Columbia dormitories on Thursday evening, but made no arrests, according to a statement by the university. Commenting on the raids on Friday, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said the Justice Department was “looking at whether Columbia’s handling of earlier incidents violated civil rights laws and included terrorism crimes.”
Civil rights groups and protesters have denounced the federal government’s actions at Columbia as an infringement on free speech. Protesters staged demonstrations this week at both the university and inside Trump Tower, located in Manhattan.
Columbia’s international students have expressed fear, with several telling NBC News on Friday that they are increasingly hesitant to criticize the Trump administration due to fears of repercussions.
The university’s journalism school said its staff and students are “witnessing and experiencing an alarming chill.”
“One does not have to agree with the political opinions of any particular individual to understand that these threats cut to the core of what it means to live in a pluralistic democracy,” the journalism school said in a statement issued Friday. “The use of deportation to suppress foreign critics runs parallel to an aggressive campaign to use libel laws in novel — even outlandish ways — to silence or intimidate the independent press.”
Columbia University in the glaring spotlight
The arrests are part of the Trump administration’s broader effort to “root out” what it calls “anti-Semitic harassment in schools and on college campuses.” And perhaps no other college campus in the country drew more attention for its pro-Palestinian demonstrations last year than Columbia.
For weeks last spring, student activists staged daily protests, occupied a university building and established an encampment of several dozen tents on university lawns, inspiring similar setups on college campuses across the country. Fueled by outrage over Israel’s war in Gaza, students pushed for their universities to divest from companies linked to the Israeli government. The activism sparked intense debates on campuses, with some students expressing concerns over antisemitism.
In the week before the arrests, the Trump administration singled out Columbia, announcing that it would cancel approximately $400 million in federal grants to the university. The administration cited “the school’s continued inaction in the face of persistent harassment of Jewish students.”
The move marked an unprecedented intervention by the federal government into the affairs of a private university.
Columbia responded by pledging to work with the federal government to restore its funding.
“We take Columbia’s legal obligations seriously and understand how serious this announcement is and are committed to combatting antisemitism and ensuring the safety and wellbeing of our students, faculty, and staff,” a university spokesperson told NBC News last week.
On Thursday, the university said it suspended or expelled some of the students who participated and temporarily revoked the diplomas of some graduates.
“I’m not surprised that the university is choosing to throw its students and workers under the bus for grant money,” Miner told NBC News. “We know exactly how much now it costs, to buy Columbia’s morals.”
