NEWARK, N.J. —After more than three months in immigration detention, Columbia University student Mahmoud Khalil returned to the New York area, where his harrowing ordeal began.
Immigration authorities arrested Khalil, 30, in March at the university housing complex where he lived in New York City. He was quickly transported thousands of miles away to a detention center in Louisiana, where he spent the last few months.
Khalil remained defiant as he spoke to reporters and supporters Saturday afternoon when he arrived at Newark International Airport.
"Your messages have kept me going. Still the fight is far from over, the genocide is still happening in Gaza, Israel is still waging a full war against Palestine," said Khalil, who was flanked by his wife, Dr. Noor Abdalla, and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y. "The U.S. government is funding this genocide, and Columbia University is investing in this genocide. This is why I was protesting, this is why I will continue protesting with every one of you, not only if they threaten me with detention. Even if they would kill me, I would still speak up for Gaza."
Asked what his message to the Trump administration would be, Khalil said, "Just the fact that I'm here sends a message."
"The fact that all of these attempts to suppress pro-Palestine voices have failed now," he said. "This is the message. My existence is a message."
Ocasio-Cortez said Khalil's imprisonment was politically motivated.
"Everybody agrees that persecution based on political speech is wrong and is a violation of all of our First Amendment rights, not just Mahmoud's," she said.
His unprecedented detention has sparked national outrage.
Further fueling the controversy, Abdalla, an American, gave birth to the couple’s first son in April while he remained behind bars.
Upon his release in Louisiana on Friday, Khalil addressed reporters briefly, saying he was excited to return to New York City and see his family.
“Although justice prevailed,” he said, “it’s long, very long overdue. And this shouldn’t have taken three months.”
“Trump and his administration, they chose the wrong person for this,” he added. “That doesn’t mean that there is a right person for this. There’s no right person who should be detained for actually protesting a genocide, for protesting their university, Columbia University.”
Assistant Homeland Security Secretary Tricia McLaughlin on Friday denounced the judicial order freeing Khalil and the judge who issued it.
“This is yet another example of how out of control members of the judicial branch are undermining national security,” McLaughlin said in a statement. “Their conduct not only denies the result of the 2024 election, it also does great harm to our constitutional system by undermining public confidence in the courts.”
The Trump administration claimed it had the authority to detain and deport Khalil, arguing that his presence in the United States threatened national security. Another charge alleges that he omitted details about his work history and membership in organizations on his permanent residency application.
The government cited an obscure provision in the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 that gives Secretary of State Marco Rubio authority to “personally determine” whether a foreign national can remain in the United States on national security grounds.
An NBC News review of more than 100 pages of court filings found that prosecutors relied on unverified tabloid reports and anecdotal claims, raising doubts about the strength of their case for deporting Khalil.
Less than 10 minutes after Khalil, who has no criminal history, was released from the detention center in Jena, Louisiana, the Trump administration filed a notice of appeal. A lawyer representing Khalil vowed to fight the appeal.
Khalil helped lead student protests over the war in Gaza, where more than 55,000 people have been killed since Israel launched its war against Hamas. He also participated in negotiations with university officials at Columbia last year, when protests at the Ivy League school gripped the nation for weeks and inspired similar demonstrations at universities around the world.
Some Jewish students at universities across the United States reported antisemitic incidents as the protest movement gained traction.
Khalil was the first of several foreign academics whom immigration authorities apprehended in the first months of Trump’s second term.
Immigration authorities arrested Tufts University student Rümeysa Öztürk, a doctoral candidate from Turkey, outside her home in Somerville, Massachusetts, on March 25. Viral street video of her arrest showed Department of Homeland Security officials dressed in plainclothes surrounding Öztürk, grabbing her by the wrists and escorting her into an unmarked vehicle.
Immigration authorities apprehended Mohsen Mahdawi, 34, a graduate student at Columbia who was born in the West Bank, during his naturalization interview in Vermont.
Federal judges also ordered the release of both Öztürk and Mahdawi in recent weeks. Other notable cases include those of a Georgetown University professor who was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement and later released after a judicial order and a Brown University professor who was deported to Lebanon.
