BOSTON (AP) — A federal judge has allowed a student from Turkey’s Tufts University to resume research and teaching while she deals with the fallout from the Trump administration’s visa revocation, which kept her in detention for six weeks.
The arrest of Rümeysa Öztürk, a doctoral student who studies children’s relationship with social media, is one of the first the Trump administration has begun targeting foreign-born students and activists involved in pro-Palestinian propaganda. She co-authored an op-ed criticizing her university’s response to Israel and the Gaza war. In March, immigration enforcement officers captured video of her being taken away in an unmarked vehicle outside her Somerville home.
Ozturk has been out of an immigration detention center in Louisiana and back on the Tufts University campus since May. But because her record in the government’s database of foreign students temporarily studying in the United States was terminated, she is unable to teach or participate in research as part of her studies.
Chief U.S. District Judge Denise J. Casper wrote in Monday’s ruling that Ozturk is likely to prevail because he claims the termination was “arbitrary and capricious, contrary to law and in violation of the First Amendment.”
The government argued the termination was legal
Government lawyers argued unsuccessfully that a federal court in Boston lacked jurisdiction and that Ozturk’s Student and Exchange Visitor Information System (SEVIS) records were lawfully terminated after her visa was revoked, making her eligible for deportation proceedings.
“The termination of SEVIS records in this case does not violate any law or regulation,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Mark Sauter said during a hearing last week. The Associated Press sent an email Tuesday seeking comment from Sauter on whether the government plans to appeal.
Ozturk, who plans to graduate next year, said in a statement that while she was grateful for the court’s decision, she was “deeply saddened” that her education “as an academic and as a woman was arbitrarily deprived during the final year of her doctoral studies.”
“I hope that one day we can create a world where everyone uses education to learn, connect, engage civically and benefit others, rather than criminalizing and punishing those who disagree with our views,” said Ozturk, who is still challenging her arrest and detention.
The then 30-year-old was one of four students who published the opinion piece in the school newspaper. It criticized the university’s response to student activists demanding that Tufts “recognize the Palestinian genocide,” disclose its investments and divest from companies with ties to Israel.
Ozturk, who is Muslim, met friends in March for iftar, a meal that breaks the fast at sunset during Ramadan, according to her lawyer, Mahsa Khanbabai. Her lawyer said her student visa had been revoked days earlier but she had not been informed of this. The government claimed that terminating her SEVIS record two hours after her arrest was the correct way to notify Tufts that her visa was revoked.
A State Department memo said Ozturk’s visa was revoked due to an assessment that her actions “could undermine U.S. foreign policy as she created a hostile environment for Jewish students and expressed support for designated terrorist organizations,” including co-writing an op-ed with a group that was later temporarily banned from campus.
Öztürk has no time to pursue his teaching and research goals
Ozturk said that without reinstating her SEVIS status, she would be ineligible to serve as a paid research assistant and unable to fully reintegrate into academic life at Tufts.
“What we have here is a bizarre legal manipulation that the government claims is just a modification of a database, but which has real consequences for Ms. Ozturk’s daily life,” her attorney, Adriana Lafaille of the American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts, told the court.
“We are running out of time to fix this. Every day she is prevented from doing the work she loves in the graduate program she came here to attend. Every day this happens means the government can continue to punish her for her protected speech.”
Ozturk’s attorneys, meanwhile, said she has completed her full course load and met all requirements to maintain her legal student status, but the government has not yet terminated her status.
Create records to collect international student information
SEVIS, authorized by Congress in the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 and administered by the Director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, “collects information concerning nonimmigrant alien students” and “uses such information to carry out ICE’s enforcement functions.”
According to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, when a SEVIS record is terminated, the student loses all on-campus and/or off-campus employment authorization and allows ICE agents to conduct an investigation to “confirm the student’s departure.”
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McCormack reported from Concord, New Hampshire.
