A federal judge in Boston has ruled that the Trump administration illegally used immigration enforcement to silence foreign students and faculty engaged in pro-Palestinian advocacy.
U.S. District Judge William Young issued a ruling on Tuesday that, according to Reuters, accuses the administration of violating the First Amendment by revoking visas and ordering deportations.
Judge Young asserted that the result illegally chilled political speech.
The decision came in a lawsuit filed by faculty groups, including the American Association of University Professors and the Middle East Studies Association.
The case began after immigration agents arrested Columbia University graduate Mahmoud Khalil, described as the first target of the initiative.
Since then, visas of hundreds of students and scholars have been canceled, and some — such as Tufts doctoral student Rumeysa Öztürk — were detained before judges ordered their release. Courts in those individual cases agreed that the actions appeared retaliatory.
Judge Young’s ruling addressed only liability, not remedies. He will decide later whether to impose an injunction barring the administration from pursuing similar deportations. Attorneys for the faculty groups have asked him to block further enforcement tied to political views.
The Trump administration Department of Justice denied that any ideological deportation policy existed, arguing that immigration enforcement was carried out for national security reasons and to protect Jewish students on U.S. campuses.
Khalil’s case turned into a flashpoint for Trump’s pledge to deport some political activists who participated in the wave of protests on U.S. college campuses against Israel’s military assault on Gaza following the October 2023 attack by Hamas terrorists.
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