Free Speech Under Attack, Says Lawyer For Tufts Student Scooped Up By ICE | EUROtoday

A lawyer for the Tufts University scholar detained on a Massachusetts road by masked Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers stated she seemed to be focused solely for exercising her proper to free speech.

Rumeysa Ozturk, a Turkish nationwide engaged on her Ph.D., penned an opinion piece for The Tufts Daily final March with three others calling on the college’s president to have interaction with pro-Palestinian protesters and divest from firms with ties to Israel, very like college students nationwide have been encouraging their establishments to do.

Ozturk was arrested Tuesday by plainclothes officers as she walked to satisfy mates to interrupt her Ramadan quick, lawyer Mahsa Khanbabai stated Thursday. Her visa had been abruptly rescinded.

“This appears to be a pattern: ICE stalking Muslim students as they are heading to or from iftar to break their fast,” Khanbabai stated. Iftar is the fast-breaking meal eaten after sundown throughout Ramadan.

Mahmoud Khalil, the Columbia University graduate detained earlier this month for his function in pro-Palestinian scholar protests, was arrested in an analogous method because the Trump administration continues its battle in opposition to Palestine supporters who usually are not U.S. residents.

Both Ozturk and Khalil have been swiftly flown to an ICE detention middle in Louisiana, the place authorities attorneys need challenges to their instances to be heard. District courts in Louisiana are appealed by means of the notoriously right-wing Fifth Circuit.

Khanbabai stated it took many hours for her to succeed in her shopper, who can also be a Fulbright scholar. Lawyers for the federal government say they transferred her earlier than a federal decide’s late Tuesday evening order to supply written documentation in the event that they moved her outdoors the state of Massachusetts.

“I had the opportunity to speak with Rumeysa late Wednesday night and she was grateful to finally get an explanation of what was happening to her and to learn of all the community support she has,” she stated.

Video Ozturk’s arrest, from a number of views, surfaced quickly after she was taken. One video seems to have been filmed from a window overlooking the road the place Ozturk was strolling. A person rapidly approaches her wearing darkish clothes along with his hood pulled over his head and begins to restrain Ozturk, who appears to react with alarm as different officers encompass her. She is then led away, into an unmarked car, along with her arms tied behind her again.

“This video should shake everyone to their core,” Khanbabai stated.

“Rumeysa, like all of us in America, is entitled to express her opinions freely. Now, she is being unlawfully targeted by the Trump administration simply because she co-authored an op-ed calling for Palestinians to have basic human rights,” she added.