(AFP) – US authorities are seeking to deport a university student who has resided in the country since she was seven years old, her lawsuit fighting the action says, as Donald Trump presses his campaign against learners linked to pro-Palestinian protests.
Trump has targeted New York’s Columbia University, which the student attends, an epicenter of the US student protest movement sparked by Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza, stripping federal funds and directing immigration officers to deport foreign student demonstrators. Critics argue that the administration’s campaign is retribution and will have a chilling effect on free speech, while its supporters insist it is necessary to restore order to campuses and protect Jewish students.
Authorities are seeking to detain Yunseo Chung, 21, a South Korean citizen and permanent resident of the United States, under the same powers they used to arrest and hold Columbia graduate student Mahmoud Khalil pending deportation. In both cases, authorities argue the students undermined US foreign policy through their actions, grounds under which the Secretary of State can deport foreigners.
Chung, whom officers have been reportedly unable to find, sued the US government Monday, arguing that “immigration enforcement — here, immigration detention and threatened deportation — may not be used as a tool to punish noncitizen speakers who express political views disfavored by the current administration.” According to Chung’s lawyers, Columbia’s Public Safety department contacted Chung to tell her that Homeland Security agents were seeking her arrest. The current whereabouts of Chung, 21, are unknown.
Columbia’s student movement has been at the forefront of protests that have exposed deep rifts over the war. Khalil was a prominent leader in the protest movement, leading negotiations between students and university authorities, and lawyers are seeking to have him released from detention in Louisiana while they fight his deportation. Chung, meanwhile, did not have such a high profile in the protest movement. Her lawyers acknowledge that she was detained and released for “obstruction of governmental administration,” and the case is pending in the New York courts system.
On March 13, federal agents searched two Columbia-owned residences apparently in connection with Chung’s case, her lawyers say. Activists call the protests that rocked numerous US campuses a show of support for the Palestinian people, while Trump condemns them as anti-Semitic and says they must end.
The president has cut $400 million in federal funding for Columbia — including research grants and other contracts — on the grounds that the institution has not adequately protected Jewish students from harassment. Columbia announced Friday a package of concessions to the Trump administration around defining anti-Semitism, policing protests, and overseeing certain academic departments. They stopped short of some of the more strenuous demands of the administration, which nonetheless welcomed the Ivy League college’s proposals.
© 2024 AFP
