Immigration Judge Rules Khalil Can Be Deported, but Legal Hurdles Remain

Immigration Judge Rules Khalil Can Be Deported, but Legal Hurdles Remain

The decision by a judge in Louisiana is an early victory for Secretary of State Marco Rubio, but a broader challenge is still being heard in federal court in Newark.

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By Jonah E. Bromwich

An immigration judge in Louisiana found on Friday that the Trump administration could deport Mahmoud Khalil, granting the government an early victory in its efforts to crack down on pro-Palestinian demonstrations on U.S. college campuses.

The ruling is far from the final word on whether Mr. Khalil, a Columbia University graduate and legal permanent resident, will be deported. His lawyers will continue their fight in Louisiana and New Jersey, arguing that he has been targeted for constitutionally protected speech.

The constitutional issues at the heart of the case will most likely get a fuller hearing in federal court in New Jersey than they did in Louisiana on Friday. For the time being, the decision by the judge there, Jamee E. Comans, affirmed the extraordinary power that the secretary of state, Marco Rubio, has asserted to target any noncitizen for deportation.

“The department has met its burden to establish removability by clear and convincing evidence,” Judge Comans said toward the end of a hearing at an immigration court in Jena, La.

Mr. Khalil led pro-Palestinian demonstrations on Columbia’s campus last year, and Mr. Rubio relied on a rarely cited law, declaring that his presence in the United States harmed the American foreign policy interest of stopping antisemitism.

Judge Comans found that the government had met the burden of evidence that the law requires, which effectively amounted to a memo from Mr. Rubio declaring that Mr. Khalil’s presence in the country enabled antisemitism. The Homeland Security Department appears not to have submitted any other concrete evidence substantiating the claim, although it has not publicly released the documents it has filed in his case.

After Judge Comans delivered her ruling, Mr. Khalil, who was otherwise silent throughout the hearing, criticized her harshly.

“I would like to quote what you said last time, that there’s nothing that’s more important to this court than due process rights and fundamental fairness,” he said. “Clearly, what we witnessed today, neither of these principles were present today or in this whole process. This is exactly why the Trump administration has sent me to this court, 1,000 miles away from my family.”

Immigration judges are employees of the executive branch, not the judiciary, and often approve the Homeland Security Department’s deportation efforts. It would be unusual for such a judge, serving the U.S. Attorney General, to grapple with the constitutional questions raised by Mr. Khalil’s case. She would also run the risk of being fired by an administration that has targeted dissenters.

“This court is without jurisdiction to entertain challenges to the validity of this law under the Constitution,” Judge Comans said as she delivered her ruling, apparently reading from a written statement.

She denied Mr. Khalil’s lawyers’ requests that they be allowed to cross-examine or depose Mr. Rubio so that he could elaborate on his claims. “This court is neither inclined or authorized” to compel such testimony, she said.

Judge Comans’s decision came at the end of a remarkable, nearly two-hour hearing at the LaSalle Immigration Court in Jena, La. Mr. Khalil was there in person, wearing a navy jumpsuit and holding a string of prayer beads.

Most of the time was taken up by Mr. Khalil’s lawyers, who mounted arguments, both broad and technical, against Mr. Rubio’s memo and other claims the Trump administration has made about Mr. Khalil related to his immigration paperwork.

Mr. Khalil’s lawyers noted that he has said in remarks on CNN that “antisemitism and any form of racism has no place on campus and in this movement,” and that Jewish demonstrators were “an integral part of this movement.”

Judge Comans was mostly calm during the hearing. She focused primarily on keeping the parties from interrupting each another while asserting that she was interested in considering only one issue: whether Mr. Khalil could be removed from the United States under the law.

“I’m going to hear from the parties on removability and that’s it,” she said.

She declined to allow Mr. Khalil’s lawyers to address their other requests, including to delay the hearing so that she could review the evidence. She also would not allow the Homeland Security Department to introduce new accusations against Mr. Khalil during the hearing.

Homeland security officials have accused Mr. Khalil of making paperwork errors that they say bolster the case for deporting him. They say he willfully failed to disclose the extent or duration of his membership in several organizations, including a United Nations agency that helps Palestinian refugees, when he applied to become a permanent U.S. resident last March.

Mr. Khalil’s lawyers spent much of their time on Friday poking holes in those arguments, and Judge Comans declined to rule on the additional allegations.

When Judge Comans issued her ruling, Mr. Khalil’s supporters in the room, including members of the New York City chapter of Jewish Voices for Peace, began to cry. Mr. Khalil rolled his prayer beads in his hands.

“Don’t worry,” he told his supporters, thanking them for being there.

Marc Van Der Hout, a lawyer for Mr. Khalil, said in a statement after the hearing that “this is not over, and our fight continues. If Mahmoud can be targeted in this way, simply for speaking out for Palestinians and exercising his constitutionally protected right to free speech, this can happen to anyone over any issue the Trump administration dislikes.”

Mr. Khalil’s immigration case now moves on to what is known as the “relief stage,” in which his lawyers will be able to argue for his right to stay in the country. If they lose, they can appeal, first to an immigration board and then to a federal court.

But the free speech and due process issues that loom over the case may first be scrutinized in federal court in New Jersey, where Mr. Khalil’s lawyers are also fighting for his release. The judge overseeing that case in Newark, Michael Farbiarz, has ordered the government not to remove Mr. Khalil from the country.

On Friday, Judge Farbiarz asked lawyers for the government and Mr. Khalil to brief him as soon as possible on the results of the Louisiana hearing.

Alena Maschke contributed reporting from Jena, La.

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