April 4, 2025 • 41 mins
Garrison and James discuss how a doxing campaign is targeting student visa and green card holders for alleged ties to pro-Palestine protests.
Sources:
https://apnews.com/article/columbia-university-mahmoud-khalil-ice-15014bcbb921f21a9f704d5acdcae7a8
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/15/nyregion/columbia-student-kristi-noem-video.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/25/nyregion/columbia-university-protester-chung-deportation.html
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/mar/25/columbia-gaza-protester-yunseo-chung-lawsuit
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/24/nyregion/columbia-student-ice-suit-yunseo-chung.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/01/us/politics/cornell-student-momodou-taal.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/29/us/rumeysa-ozturk-tufts-student-detained.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/01/us/israel-gaza-student-protests-canary-mission.html
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/mar/14/israel-betar-deportation-list-trump
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/trump-administration-takes-aim-immigrant-students-rcna198346
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Als media.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
This is it could happen here. I'm Garrison Davis. Today
I'm joined by James Stout. This episode is going to
be about ICE actions against students, scholars, and professors around
the country and this wave of deportations targeting people engaged
in pro Palestine speech protest, as well as some individuals
(00:26):
who have been roped up in this new wave of
deportations who have not publicly engaged in Palestine activism. Let's
start on the evening of Saturday, March eighth, Mahmoud Khalil
and his wife were returning home from dinner when plain
clothesed ICE agents followed the couple into their campus apartment
building at Columbia University. A man wearing a Marvel graphic
(00:48):
tea arrested Khalil for then unknown reasons and threatened to
arrest Khalil's wife, who is eight months pregnant and an
American citizen. When Khalil's wife brought his green card from
their apartment, says, one of the ICE agents placed a
phone call informing someone Khalil was a permanent resident, to
which the person on the phone replied, let's bring him
in any way.
Speaker 1 (01:09):
You've got to be under arrest.
Speaker 3 (01:11):
Turn around, around, turn around.
Speaker 1 (01:14):
Okay, Okay, he's not resisting phone. Okay, you.
Speaker 3 (01:31):
Guys really don't need to be doing.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
All of that. During the arrest, Khalil's lawyer, Amy Greer,
spoke in the phone with one of the ICE agents
who said that they were acting on State Department orders
to revoke Khalil's student visa. Greer reiterated to the agents
that Khalil was in fact a permanent resident with a
(01:54):
green card, but the ICE agent just responded by saying
they were revoking the green card instead. Khalil's a graduate
student who has been studying at Columbia for over two years.
Last year, Khalil emerged as a visible figure in the
college encampment protests, becoming a public spokesperson and a lead
negotiator on behalf of Columbia University apartheid divest. Though never
(02:18):
being arrested, Khalil faced harassment from right wing Zionist docsing
campaigns calling for his deportation, and when ICE did come
for Khalil, disappearing him to a detention facility in Louisiana
and cutting him off from communication with his wife and lawyer.
Throughout all of this, he was not charged with any crime. Instead,
(02:38):
Ice in the State Department are using a rarely used
Cold War era immigration statute that gives the Secretary of
State the power to exclude or deport any non citizen
of the United States if there are quote reasonable grounds
to believe that in individual's entry, proposed activities, presence, or
activities in the United States would have quote potentially serious
(03:00):
adverse foreign policy consequences.
Speaker 3 (03:03):
Yeah, that was the one that like I remember at
the time, you and I were discussing this, like in
our group chat, and we were trying to work out
like how the Secretary of State could be revoking a
green card, like yeah, and I think you found this,
so you found it somewhere in it. The Trump administration
has been very very good at finding very obscure pieces
(03:24):
of law that it can wheeled against migrants. Right, Like,
no one in twenty sixteen would have foreseen what they
did with Title forty two, which is a public health law,
and they're doing something similar here. I mean, they may
have spent the last four years looking for these things,
es cecially when the campus protests began, but like, this
is entirely unprecedented as far as some were.
Speaker 2 (03:46):
And right if this happened like we discussed how this
case was probably going to be used as a testing
ground for employing these tactics on a more widespread scale,
creating legal precedent, and sure enough, Khalil's case was not
an outlier. This was just the first public instance of
the Trump administrations directed targeting of students they believed to
(04:08):
be associated with protests against Israel and its actions in Gaza,
and this wave of actions by ICE had actually already
begun before Khalil's arrest. The day before Khalil was arrested,
ICE agents knocked on the door of PhD student Rajani
Shrini Vassen, who a few days prior was suddenly notified
that her student visa had been revoked. When ICE agents knocked,
(04:30):
she did not answer the door. The next day, I
showed up again to her Columbia University apartment. Trinavassen was
not home, but upon hearing of Khalil's arrest just a
few hours later, she decided to quickly collect some belongings
and flee to Canada. Five days later, when ICE returned
to her residence, but this time with a warrant, Trinavassen
was already gone. Homeland Security Secretary Christy Nome praised this
(04:53):
as quote unquote self deportation.
Speaker 3 (04:55):
Yeah, they talk about this a lot, Like self deportation
is definitely one of their goals. They talked about it
before Trump even came into power. Like that's what we're
seeing a lot of these spectacle raids and and like
spectacle deportations gear tactics. Yeah, yeah, exactly the desires that
people leave. Is she a Canadian citizen or like I.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
Don't believe so, No, Okay, it was just the fastest
flight from LaGuardia out of the country, out of like,
you know, the closest, the closest she could be.
Speaker 3 (05:24):
Yeah, I wonder what her immigration states is in Canada now.
Speaker 2 (05:27):
She is currently figuring this whole situation out still, Okay,
navigating her legal options both in Canada and the States.
Speaker 3 (05:33):
Yeah, that'll be interesting too to see what Canada can
offer her. And like, I don't think the Trump administration
would go after like having her extradited back because if
she says she's not accused of a crime and then
they've kind of got what they wanted. It'll be interesting
to follow that.
Speaker 2 (05:47):
There is no need for extradition because none of the
people that were talking about today were choosed of any crime.
Speaker 3 (05:52):
Yeah, with the other cases of quote unquote like self deportation,
one of the issues is people have had their passport
seized and held, like like lots of Venice vigrants, so
they actually can't or it would be very difficult for
them to like just get on a fly and leave.
Speaker 2 (06:06):
Which I think is in part why she made the
decision to get out when she could.
Speaker 3 (06:10):
Right.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
DHS claimed in a statement that Trina Vasan advocated violence
and was quote involved in activities supporting hamas a terrorist
organization unquote. ICE is targeting her seemingly stems from being
mass arrested while trying to return to her apartment from
a picnic with friends on the same day as the
Hamilton Hill occupation. She couldn't get home and was caught
(06:33):
up in the crowd and was arrested among one hundred
other people. She received two summons for obstructing traffic and
failure to disperse, but her case was quickly dismissed. Homeland
Security claims that failing to declare these two summons is
what caused her visa to be revoked. Okay, interesting, that
(06:54):
same week ICE went after another Green card holder at Columbia,
a twenty one year old student named Yung Sam How. Chung,
a permanent resident who immigrated to the United States from
South Korea with her family when she was seven. On
March ninth, ICE agents visited her parents' home looking for Chung,
and that day she received an odd text message, reading, Hi, Yunsau,
This is Audrey from the police. My job is to
(07:16):
reach out to you and see if you have any
questions about your recent arrest and the process going forward.
When are you available for a phone call unquote. This
recent arrest was allegedly in reference to being detained, among
others at a sit in protest at Bernard College on
March fifth. Chung was charged and then released with misdemeanor obstruction.
(07:37):
After receiving that sketchy text message, Chung got an email
from Columbia Public Safety reading quote, the US Attorney's Office
for the Southern District of New York has asked us
to inform you that Homeland Security Investigation agents are seeking
to make contact with you in connection with an administrative
warrant for your arrest. Consistent with universities practice, we wanted
to share this information and their request with you. If
(07:59):
you are represented by counsel, it may make sense for
your lawyer to speak directly with DHS unquote. Chung's lawyer
decided to call quote unquote to Audrey from the police,
who revealed that she was actually an HSI agent and
that the State Department was revoking Miss Chung's residency status. Now,
rather than opting for self deportation or turning herself into
(08:21):
immigration authorities, Chung decided to go into hiding and fight
the deportation in the courts while trying to evade ised attention.
When Ice failed to locate her, they enlisted the help
of federal prosecutors. To quote from the New York Times quote,
on March tenth, Perry Carboni, a high ranking lawyer in
the Federal Prosecutor's office, told Miss Amaud, miss Chung's attorney,
(08:42):
that the Secretary of State, mister Rubio, had revoked Miss
Chung's visa. Miss amd responded that Miss Chung was not
in the country on a visa and was a permanent resident,
according to the lawsuit. Mister Carboni responded that mister Rubio
had quote revoked that as well, unquote. Yeah, so this
is the exact same language we saw with Khalil, and
(09:02):
it displays a general uncaring towards who they are actually
targeting and what their actual legal status is in the
United States. They think they're going after people's student visas,
but when it turns out they have green cards, that
doesn't stop them. They still continue to do it anyway.
On March thirteenth, Ice searched two residences on campus with warrants,
citing a statute for harboring non citizens, but Chung was
(09:24):
nowhere to be found. Like Khalil, the Trump administration is
arguing that her presence of the United States hinders the
administration's foreign policy agenda. But her lawyers note that Chung
was not, by any means a quote unquote movement leader.
She was simply one of hundreds of students who joined
in nationwide protests against Israel's actions in Gaza. Her lawyer's
(09:45):
right quote, Miss Chung has not made public statements to
the press or otherwise assumed a high profile role in
these protests. She was rather one of a large group
of college students raising, expressing, and discussing shared concerns unquote.
I had previously faced university disciplinary process which found she
was not in violation of any university policy related to protests.
(10:07):
Last year, Chung's lawyers filed a lawsuit to prevent her deportation,
claiming that ICE's actions against Chung are illegal and unconstitutional.
This lawsuit reads, quote, Officials at the highest echelon's government
are attempting to use immigration enforcement as a bludgeon to
suppress speech that they dislike, including Miss Chung's speech. ICE's
(10:28):
shocking actions against Miss Chung form part of a larger
pattern of attempted US government repression of constitutionally protected protest
activity and other forms of speech unquote. On March twenty fifth,
a federal judge granted a temporary restraining order halting efforts
from ICE to detain or relocate Chung. The judge said
(10:50):
that the government produced quote nothing in the record to
indicate Chung is a danger to the community or a
quote unquote foreign policy risk, or that she was in
any communication with terrorist organizations. The judge said that there
would be quote no trip to Louisiana here unquote. This
is in reference to the big iceed attention facility in Louisiana.
(11:13):
We'll be right back after this ad break, Okay. We're
back now. Although Chung has at least temporarily halted ICE's
efforts to detain or deporter, not all legal recourses have
(11:37):
proven successful. This week, a US district judge declined a
request to block the deportation of Cornell's student Mamadou Tall
after the State Department revoked his visa on March thirty first,
Tall released a statement, quote, given what we have seen
across the United States, I have lost faith that a
favorable ruling from the courts would guarantee my personal safety
(11:59):
and ability to express my beliefs. I've lost faith I
could walk the streets without being abducted. Weighing these options,
I took the decision to leave on my own terms.
Speaker 3 (12:10):
Yeah, it's pretty bleak.
Speaker 2 (12:12):
So Tall has elected for the quote unquote self deportation option,
at least for now. I believe his case is going
to continue, but he is not going to remain in
the United States.
Speaker 3 (12:22):
Yeah. I think he returned to the UK, right.
Speaker 2 (12:25):
I believe so. Yeah, he's a British citizen now. Interestingly,
last September, Cornell University itself tried to revoke Tall's student
visa for involvement in student protests but he successfully appealed
and was able to continue his African studies PhD remotely.
Speaker 3 (12:42):
Yeah. I spoke to him a little bit back then,
just FIA direct message, But I think at that time,
whatever his agreement was, it seems like there was a
component of it that at least he didn't want to
talk about it in public, which is fine. Everyone has
the right to do that, and he should do it
was best for himself. But maybe I'll try and follow
up with him again now see if he wants to speak,
because he seems to have like he's been of all
(13:03):
of these people at the one who's been able to
make the most statements and then control his narrative to
some degree. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (13:10):
No, he entered this period of like radio silence after
he won his appeal last fall, and then only started
speaking publicly again once he began getting targeted by the
Trump administration.
Speaker 3 (13:21):
Yeah, like the past month and a half. I think
he proactively filed that suit right like before.
Speaker 1 (13:26):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (13:27):
Yeah, Now, the scale that Mark Rubio and I start
seeking for in regards to deep ortations is seemingly going
to be increasingly large. On March twenty seventh, Secretary of
State Mark Rubio claimed that he has revoked over three
hundred student visas so far, saying at a press conference, quote,
we do it every day. Every time I find one
(13:49):
of these lunatics, I take away their visas unquote.
Speaker 3 (13:53):
Now there are a.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
Few ways the government is currently trying to find these
quote unquote lunatics. I used to seem to be targeting
non citizens who have been arrested or detained at Palestine protests,
even if their charges were subsequently dropped. This is the
case for Chung and Shriny Vawsen, as well as former
student Leca Cordia, a Palestinian who was arrested at Columbia
(14:14):
campus protests in April of twenty twenty four She's currently
being held in an ice attention facility in Texas. Now
beyond arrest records, the government is utilizing the World Wide
Web and social media to identify new and returning visa
applicants and possibly current visa holders that quote support terrorist
(14:35):
organizations unquote. Social media screening of immigrants and visa holders
has been slowly ramping up since twenty fourteen and accelerated
during Trump's first term, but a new directive from Secretary
of State Mark Rubio titled enhanced screening and social media
vetting for visa applicants was sent out on March twenty
fifth and leaked by journalist Ken Klippenstein. The directive cites
(14:58):
two executive orders from Trump measures to combat anti Semitism
end quote protecting the United States from foreign terrorists and
other national security and public safety threats. The State Department
is now requiring consular officers to conduct a quote unquote
mandatory social media review with screenshotting for students and student
(15:19):
exchange visitors with the intent of looking for evidence of
quote advocating for, sympathizing with, or persuading others to endorse
or espouse terrorist activities or support a designated foreign terrorist
organization quote. Now this applies to FM and J visas,
so student exchange visas, academic visas, and vocational visas. The
(15:40):
directive also instructs officers to search social media for quote
conduct that bears a hostile attitude towards US citizens or
US culture, including government institutions or founding principles unquote, which
is kind of the most incredibly broad thing I've ever
s scene.
Speaker 3 (16:00):
Yeah, I mean, that's leaving it at the create discretion
of the officer, right, there's.
Speaker 2 (16:05):
Already been an instance of a US customers agent's denying
entry to someone who had quote unquote anti Trump sentiments
found on their phone. Now, though this new directive is
focused on denying or revoking student visas, the Department of
Homeland Security is seeking to expand its social media data
collection to US citizenship, green card, and asylum applicants, basically
(16:29):
anyone and everyone in the US immigration system, no matter
their current status or what previous vetting they might have
already gone through.
Speaker 3 (16:36):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
On March fifth, DHS issued a sixty day notice for
public comment on a proposal for quote uniform of vetting
standards and national security screening unquote that includes the collection
of social media information for all non citizens applying for
immigration benefits like citizenship or permanent residency. A statement from
the US Citizenship and Immigration Service reads, quote, these efforts
(16:59):
ensure that those seeking immigration benefits to live and work
in the United States do not threaten public safety, undermine
national security, or promote harmful anti American ideologies unquote.
Speaker 3 (17:12):
Yeah, Like the anti American ideologies again is just fastly broad.
Speaker 2 (17:15):
Right, It's like crazy red scare level stuff.
Speaker 3 (17:18):
Yeah, and I'm guessing this will be either like a
literal control f of whatever they can find of your
public social media or aif that's some kind of AI assistant.
That's what it seems to be, right, Like.
Speaker 2 (17:30):
Former immigration agents have suggested that they're probably going to
use some AI system for this, as they've already kind
of used more primitive versions, but ramping up to this
scale and with like this increased focus and like attention
on quote unquote AI is going to affect the way
that they do this betting process. Absolutely, yeah, great. So
though the government is trying to increase their social media
(17:52):
screening so far, they actually haven't had to do that
much of their own research to identify targets for removal.
On March seventeenth, a Georgetown scholar named Bdar Khan Suri
was arrested by Homeland Security outside his home in Virginia,
where he lives with his wife, who's a US citizen,
and their three kids. According to Surrey's lawyer, masked agents
(18:14):
quote refused to tell him the basis for the arrest,
handcuffed him, and forced him into an unmarked black SUV. Later,
his wife was informed that her husband's visa was revoked
based on social media posts. And that Surrey was sent
to ice attention in Louisiana. Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Trisha
(18:34):
McLoughlin posted on x that Surrey was quote actively spreading
Hamas propaganda and promoting anti Semitism on social media. The
Secretary of State issued a determination that Surrey's activities and
presents in the United States rendered him deportable unquote. Of course,
any single post in support of Palestine is going to
(18:56):
be seen as quote unquote promoting antisemitism. According to Mark Rubio,
Surrey's lawyer wrote in a court filing, quote, doctor Surrey
is an academic, not an activist, but he spoke out
on social media about his views on the Israel Gazo war.
Even more so, his wife is an outspoken critic of
the Israeli government and the violence it has perpetuated against
(19:17):
Palestinians unquote. Yet see that he was identified through his wife, right, correct,
and we'll get to that.
Speaker 3 (19:23):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (19:24):
Surrey has no criminal record, and according to a colleague,
he did not attend campus protests. However, Surrey's lawyer writes
that his family have been victims of a docsing campaign,
with his wife stating that a website had quote claimed
falsely that my husband and I have quote ties to
Hamas unquote. The Homeland Security Assistant Secretary references that claim
in a public statement on Twitter. And this harassment stems
(19:47):
in part from Surrey's father in law being a maud Yusef,
a former advisor to Hamas. A federal judge blocked Suri's
deportation as immigration court proceedings continue. But he's still means
in iced attention.
Speaker 3 (20:01):
What kind of visa was he on?
Speaker 2 (20:04):
He's not a green card holder. He received his visa
to continue doctoral research on peace building in Iraq and Afghanistan.
It's some kind of like academic or exchange visa. I
don't think we know the exact type that he has.
Speaker 3 (20:18):
Okay, yeah, that would be like it would be interesting
to know if like, are they searching just through F
one visa databases or are they said I mean obviously
not if they're finding these green card people, but.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
Like, well, I think specifically in this case, they're searching
social media. They're not searching through their own databases. They
don't care what kind of visa he has. They're looking
at this docksing campaign that's been targeted at him and
his family for like over a year and using that
as the basis to deport him.
Speaker 3 (20:46):
Right, and then being like, can we deport he's not
a citizen?
Speaker 2 (20:50):
So yes, basically even though his wife is a citizen.
Speaker 3 (20:52):
Yeah, it's children publy therefore also citizens.
Speaker 2 (20:55):
His wife who's whose father is a mod yusef they
can't deport her because she's a citizen or at least
they can't abort her right now. Who knows if they'll
try to denaturalize in the future. Yeah, but this is
the easiest person to target.
Speaker 3 (21:08):
Yeah, And I think that's kind of what they're going for. Like,
a lot of this is it's like the politics of
owning the Libs, Right, It's like the politics of being
angry at your niece and nephew on Facebook and wanting
to humiliate them.
Speaker 2 (21:24):
Like.
Speaker 3 (21:24):
It's not a particularly lately coherent policy other than like
the Palestine protests made a lot of people on the
right mad and they don't like migrants, and that now
they're using this obscure legal provision as a cudgel against
everything they dislike.
Speaker 2 (21:41):
Yeah, and using social media to identify people who have
never been arrested, never been charged with anything. Yeah, we're
going to finish our discussion on these docing campaigns and
ICE action starking students after.
Speaker 3 (21:53):
This ad break. All right, we're back, So right.
Speaker 2 (22:06):
Now, the two main vectors for iceed attention whether you
have a green card or a visa, seems to be
previous arrests or these mass doxing campaigns. Now, someone like
Mahmoud Khalil was never arrested or charged with the crime,
but instead has been the target of harassment from both
a local campus doxing account run by Columbia professors and
(22:27):
fellow students, as well as larger right wing Zionist organizations
like Canary Mission. A few days before being arrested by ICE,
Canary Mission posted a video naming Khalil as a quote
unquote siren mog suspected foreign national alert. So what is
Canary Mission? If you're lucky enough to be unaware? Since
(22:48):
twenty fifteen, Canary Mission has been collecting and publishing a
personal information of people they accuse of promoting quote hatred
of the United States, Israel, and Jews on a North
American college campus and beyond unquote. Now they have profiles
for a few legitimate American neo Nazis, but many profiles
(23:09):
only cite criticism of the Israeli government and its actions
in Gaza as proof of alleged anti Semitism. And now
there is increasing evidence that the government is using websites
like Canary Mission to target students, professors, and scholars for
ICE deportation, essentially outsourcing intail gathering from these pro Israel
non government organizations. A few weeks ago, Canary Mission uploaded
(23:33):
a profile for Rumesa oz Turk, a Turkish graduate student
at Tufts University. They included a picture her resume and
linked to an op ed she co wrote last year
for her student paper criticizing the university for its ties
to Israel amidst the war in Gaza. For this, the
Canary Mission claimed oz Turk quote engaged in anti Israel
(23:55):
activism unquote. Two weeks later, while walking along to if
Tar dinner for Ramadan, a plane clothes ICE agent approached
oz Turk on the sidewalk. As he grabbed her arms
and wrestled away her phone, five more agents surrounded her
and pulled up their gator masks as neighbors began filming
the arrest. Within twenty four hours, she was moved to
(24:17):
ICE attention in Louisiana. A statement from Homeland Security claimed
that HSI Homeland Security Investigation had determined that oz Turk
quote engaged in activities in support of hamas a foreign
terrorist organization that relishes the killing of Americans, and Secretary
of State Mark Rubio said, quote, we gave you a
visa to come and study and get a degree, not
(24:40):
to become a social activist that tears up our university campuses.
Speaker 3 (24:44):
Unquote. Yeah, I mean again, like writing an op ed
is like as central to the First Amendment as things
can be.
Speaker 2 (24:52):
Right, Yeah, there's no evidence she was even attending campus protests,
let alone r tearing up tearing up the university. She
co wrote an op ed, And you should not be
deported for engaging in protest on a university campus at all. Right,
this is flatantly unconstitutional, extremely worrying. The fact that this
person just got a profile in the Canary Mission website
(25:15):
for writing an op ed and then this is used
as justification for her deportation is still like an even
greater escalation.
Speaker 3 (25:22):
Yeah, Like if we're talking about like this is sort
of like liberal idea of the marketplace of ideas, right,
Like the way that the ideas enter the marketplace, like,
you will find nothing more amenable to liberalism than writing
an op ed in your campus newspaper. Right, that is
the most like well behaved, straight down the middle, constitutionally
(25:43):
protected thing way to engage in anti genocide activism, pro
Palestine activism. So like in a sense, this one is
particularly disturbing, like a a frontal assault on First Amendment
rise for non citizens is what it is. Yes.
Speaker 2 (25:58):
On March twenty fourth, Canary Misis published a new section
of their website titled Uncovering Foreign Nationals, which lists the
profiles of non citizens who they believe qualify for deportation.
Speaker 3 (26:12):
Jesus.
Speaker 2 (26:14):
Another far right pro Israel docs in group called Batar,
which even the ADL lists as an extremist group, which
is wild. Baitar says that they have given the Trump
administration a deportation list of thousands of names, including citizens
that they expect to be denaturalized. People like Mamadoo Tall
(26:34):
and Mahmoud Khalil have been targeted by both of these organizations.
Speaker 3 (26:39):
People will be familiar with. I don't know if it's
Bitar or Bitar, but like you probably have seen videos
of them on campus trying to hand pages to people pagers.
Speaker 2 (26:48):
Yeah, like making light of the pager attack Israel.
Speaker 3 (26:52):
Did I mean making a threat? Like sure, Like if
you're going to come onto a campus and make a
fucking bomb threat and accused someone else of terrorism. I
mean the hypocrisy is kind of the point.
Speaker 2 (27:04):
But or even just like you know, quote unquote celebrating
the deaths of people, right.
Speaker 3 (27:08):
Yeah, right, like mocking this attack which killed children, which
you know, crippled people. It's just disgusting. It's like just important.
They seem to get a lot of attention online because
they do the thing where they go up to people
and say deliberately provocative things and then film their reactions. Right,
they're kind of irl trolling.
Speaker 2 (27:32):
The past week, ICE actions against students have seemingly accelerated.
Ali Reza Drudi, a doctoral student from Iran studying at
the University of Alabama, was arrested by ICE on March
twenty fifth in the middle of the night at his
off campus apartment. Drudi's the entry visa expired, but he
was allowed to stay in the States as he still
maintained his student's status. Yeah, it's unknown why exactly he
(27:56):
was targeted. He has no ties to protests or any
notable online footprint.
Speaker 3 (28:01):
It could be his ethnic origin, right leg, Yeah, it
could be his name, right yeah. But that we should
explain the status thing a bit more for people who
aren't familiar. So like, sure, your status is when you're
in good standing with the university. So normally that means
you need to be enrolled in twelve credits per You
might be on semesters, you might be on courters. I
don't think it's usually matters you have to there's a
(28:23):
minimum course load. It may be different for different systems.
I don't know. You'd also need to be in good
standing in terms of like not lay on your fees
or your tuition fees, that kind of stuff, right not
in any you haven't been expelled or excluded from the
university for any actions that you've taken, that kind of thing.
It means you are currently a student at the university. Basically,
(28:44):
the only time this normally affects international students that I'm
aware of as a person who now teaches students is
like they can't drop below a certain courseload, when otherwise
they may wish to drop below a certain courseload to
either focus on they might have like a research position.
They might be doing other stuff on campus like taing. Right,
Sometimes that ta and counts towards their course, so sometimes
(29:05):
it doesn't, but it can affect things like that. But
generally it would be the university that would update that status. Right,
that would notify US Customs and Immigration if somebody fell
out of compliance with that. If I'm hearing right, that
doesn't seem like that's what happened here, right.
Speaker 2 (29:24):
No, Simply his entry visa expired, so if he left
the country, he then would have to get another visa
to get back, but he can stay as long as
he still has his valid student status. So not only
is ICE trying to revoke these like visas, but they're
trying to essentially say that by revoking these visas, they
are also attempting to strip them of their student status,
(29:46):
which is like a separate like step. These things can
get kind of very very blurry though.
Speaker 3 (29:52):
Yeah, Like I don't quite know how that works in
terms of like our ICE supposed to be able to
I don't think it hugely matters at this.
Speaker 2 (29:59):
Technically, the State Department does have that ability, but it's
under the same like Foreign policy risk designation, Okay, and
they'll justify it by saying, well, his visa already expired,
so we're just removing him because his visa expired, even
though that's not really how this works.
Speaker 3 (30:15):
Yeah, then they don't have to remove him for that reason.
But yeah, in this case, I guess they've go for
something else.
Speaker 2 (30:21):
No, because the University of Alabama did not elect to
rescind his student status. He was a student in good standing, Yeah,
and thus legally allowed in the United States.
Speaker 3 (30:32):
Yeah. Yeah, like everyone else here, he hadn't done anything
that would, under normal circumstances lead him having any interactions
with USCIS.
Speaker 2 (30:42):
Just this last week, I sttained a University of Minnesota
grad student at their off campus housing. The university released
a statement saying that they had no prior knowledge of
this incident and had not shared any information with federal authorities.
This person's name is still not released.
Speaker 3 (30:58):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (30:59):
Last week, a student udent at the Southern Illinois University
had their visa revoked. The school administration told their college
paper that the university has no role in the visa
revocation process. The Illinois Governor's office is working with schools
across the state to quote ensure they are being vigilant
about what's happening on their respective campuses. The Governor's team
(31:19):
has asked universities to communicate with international students about the
general resources available to them through the institution. In addition,
we have suggested that they connect impacted students with legal
resources that have been in place for several years. According
to a statement sent to the university paper, The Daily
Egyptian Tina Sickinger, which is a very cool name, the
(31:43):
school's director of International Student and Scholar Services sent an
email to the international student body of Southern Illinois University
advising them to carry photocopies of immigration documents with them
at all times, as well as proof of enrollment and
records of US residences. The email recommended that students quote
use caution on social media and exercise discretion when participating
(32:07):
in political demonstrations or protests unquote, warning that though protests
should be protected speech quote, such activities can sometimes be
misinterpreted and make carry risks to your immigration status unquote. Unfortunately,
I think this is the university trying to look out
for these students.
Speaker 3 (32:24):
Yeah, that's the best you could expect from them, really.
Speaker 2 (32:28):
And they are providing like legal resources to these students,
but they're essentially saying like you shouldn't post anything or
do any protests because then ice might come kidnap you. Yeah,
which is just a fucked up situation to be in,
and like yeah, they don't have like any other ability
to like stop this right now. I am curious what
Prisker is going to continue to do here though.
Speaker 3 (32:49):
Yeah, I mean, none of what they've said is like wrong,
It's kind of what you can expect from university. The
best you can expect from the university really is like, hey,
we've noticed it's happening.
Speaker 2 (33:01):
So that is the situation as it currently stands. I
do have one final tidbit here just that highlights the
absurdity of this whole situation. On March twenty fourth, a
lawsuit on behalf of Israeli Columbia students and relatives of
Israeli October seventh victims was filed against Columbia Jewish Voice
for Peace and Students for Justice in Palestine, Columbia University
(33:24):
Apartheid divest and individual Columbia students, including Mahmoud Khalil. The
lawsuit allege is that these Colombia groups and students are
the domestic propaganda arm of Hamas, and even claims that
these groups had advanced notice that the October seventh attack
was going to take place.
Speaker 3 (33:42):
Oh, come on.
Speaker 2 (33:44):
So the plan was kept secret among Hamas's own political
allies in the region, but they gave an Ivy League
university in the New York City.
Speaker 3 (33:55):
It had to tip off. They just let him know
what was coming.
Speaker 2 (33:59):
Completely absurd.
Speaker 3 (34:00):
The absolutely like like the IDF completely failed to see
this coming, right, But they're not the folks at the
Ivy League universities who were who were ready and waiting.
Speaker 2 (34:10):
Hamas didn't tell the who thies, They didn't tell Iran,
they didn't tell Hesbola, but they told student activist groups
in New York City at the Columbia University campus.
Speaker 3 (34:23):
Yeah, absolutely ludicrous. Like I eagerly await this this court case.
I guess to see what evidence they have of this.
The evidence is going to be like someone had a
Palestinian flag.
Speaker 2 (34:34):
Some of the quote unquote evidence that they that they
allege is that some of these like activist accounts had
a renewed activity in October of twenty twenty three, like
before the attack happened. But this is just a simple coincidence.
Obviously these people did not have a heads up that
the October seventh attack was going to take place.
Speaker 3 (34:55):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (34:56):
The lawsuit also argues that protest activity is not First
Amendment protected speech, but in fact, quote substantial assistance in
the form of propaganda and recruiting services and in coordination
with a designated foreign terrorist organization, again alleging there's some
kind of communication between Hobmas and student activists in New
(35:17):
York City.
Speaker 3 (35:17):
Yeah, this is ludicrous. Like, one of the reasons that
maybe we're seeing this so much over the Palestine advocacy
is that HAMAS is a listed foreign terrorist organization. Many
other groups and lots of groups in that part of
the world are, But like it's just a bigger stick
to wave I guess material aid or that no one
has been actually accused of material aid to foreign terrorist
(35:39):
organization as far as I'm aware, But like that is
kind of the sort of stick that they're waving, right,
that is the thing that they're alleging.
Speaker 2 (35:47):
I will end us with just this kind of final note. Now,
while there are little signs that this would happen at
a scale this large and disfocused under a democratic president,
a degree of consent for this type of targeting was
manufactured the past year as it relates to Palestine protests,
with some liberals and democratic politicians associating activists as pro
(36:09):
hamas terrorists. And this is the consequence of that public
perception building and the consent being manufactured for that framing.
And now that the even more evil side is in charge,
they can take that justification and run with it way
further than what a Joe Biden or a Kamala Harris
would have done. So it is far worse, but it's
not in a political bubble. This has been like a
(36:31):
growing project for the past few years.
Speaker 3 (36:34):
There was no point at which to Biden administration really
like effusively said, this is protected First Amendment speech. Yeah,
we may not like it, but it is central to
the Bill of Rights. It's central to what America is
supposed to be about.
Speaker 2 (36:47):
They never defended the constitutionality of this speech. Yeah, Nor
would they have intervened to stop the deportation of someone
like Tall if Cornell decided to revoke his status, right right, Yeah,
I don't think they buy an administration or a Kamala
Harris administration would be directed in these these universities to
take that action themselves, nor would they be I think,
(37:07):
revoking student visas at skill like this, No, but they
would have let Ice do the stuff that Ice does
if universities themselves elect to remove student visas or unenroll
these students. And like a degree of the complacency here
is placed on the actual university administrations, the university staff,
who have been vilifying these protesters for the past two years.
Speaker 3 (37:31):
Yeah, and I mean in some cases, right, like I'm
thinking of one of Colombia, Like professors have got away
with things which are absolutely unacceptable and like one hundred
percent in some violation of your agreement with the university
as a member of the faculty, like doxing your students. Yeah,
photographing students without their consent, following students around like absolutely unacceptable,
(37:56):
Like in any other context that you would be immediately
shit canned, Like really, really, the only reason you can
lose ten ure seemingly is being a fucking creep to
students or stealing a lot of money. And like universities
did allow that for more than a year under the
Biden administration, and like we're seeing the consequences of that now.
Speaker 2 (38:16):
It's also worth noting that since I've had to quote
from so many government statements this episode, the Trump admin
is continuing to correlate any expression of sympathy or solidarity
with Palestine as explicit support for Hamas. Basically, anything you
say that's critical of the Israeli government its actions in
Gaza are being interpreted by the Trump administration as anti
(38:39):
Semitism and support for the October seventh massacre. This is
a false equivalency. What the government alleges should not be
automatically taken as the truth. These tactics have been used
for years to broadly smear pro Palestine activists while also
hurting anti Zionist Jews. And I guess like, finally, we
are not necess necessarily endorsing every single thing that every
(39:03):
single one of these students has said. We do not
necessarily agree with the framing of every single sentence that
they have said.
Speaker 3 (39:09):
Yeah, I mean, we don't know everything that they've said.
Speaker 2 (39:12):
We can, yeah, exactly. This is like completely separate to that.
Speaker 3 (39:15):
Yeah, it doesn't matter, Like we are defending their right
to engage in constitutionally protected to speaking.
Speaker 2 (39:20):
Correct no matter what they're saying, no matter if they
have opinions on Hamas, that differ from ours. No matter
what they are saying at a campus protest, it should
not result in ICE targeting them and hunting them down
and forcing students who attend to sit in protests into
hiding to defend their own rights and to keep their
green cards. This is like a completely absurd and like
(39:43):
blatantly fascist to use the now overused word frankly, but
this is like this is this is what that is.
If this was happening in China, this was happening in Russia,
in other countries, people would be very very quick to
call out.
Speaker 3 (39:57):
I mean, it does happen in Russia, right people, exactly?
People just yeah, yeah, And the State Department of this
country has called it out right like it at rightly.
I don't agree with everything the State Department does, but
they do agree with him on that, like yeah, And
I think this is like I know, if you find
yourself having a discussion about this, I think almost everyone
(40:18):
in America can find something that they disagree with the
government on or have disagreed with the government on, and
like this hurts every single one of us, right, like
everyone's right to freedom of speech is challenged. When someone's
right to freedom of speech is challenged, and like, I
think that is the way to approach this. It doesn't
really matter if the people whose speech is being challenged
(40:41):
right now, their speech is if it's odious to us,
if it's something that we don't agree with, Like that
isn't what's at stake. What's at stake is everyone's right
to say everything without government consequences.
Speaker 2 (40:53):
Well, I think that doesn't for us today. At it
could happen here. We will continue to report on utar
getting of students, scholars and professors, and immigrants in general
as the Trump administration ramps up its deportation efforts. If
you would like to contact us about these topics, we
have an encrypted email address at cool Zone tips at
(41:16):
proton dot me. It is end to end encrypted, so
if you use another encrypted email service or another proton
mail account to send the email only, then is it encrypted.
Speaker 1 (41:31):
It could Happen Here is a production or cool Zone Media.
For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website
Coolzonemedia dot com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can
now find sources for it could Happen here listed directly
in episode descriptions. Thanks for listening,
Als media.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
This is it could happen here. I'm Garrison Davis. Today
I'm joined by James Stout. This episode is going to
be about ICE actions against students, scholars, and professors around
the country and this wave of deportations targeting people engaged
in pro Palestine speech protest, as well as some individuals
(00:26):
who have been roped up in this new wave of
deportations who have not publicly engaged in Palestine activism. Let's
start on the evening of Saturday, March eighth, Mahmoud Khalil
and his wife were returning home from dinner when plain
clothesed ICE agents followed the couple into their campus apartment
building at Columbia University. A man wearing a Marvel graphic
(00:48):
tea arrested Khalil for then unknown reasons and threatened to
arrest Khalil's wife, who is eight months pregnant and an
American citizen. When Khalil's wife brought his green card from
their apartment, says, one of the ICE agents placed a
phone call informing someone Khalil was a permanent resident, to
which the person on the phone replied, let's bring him
in any way.
Speaker 1 (01:09):
You've got to be under arrest.
Speaker 3 (01:11):
Turn around, around, turn around.
Speaker 1 (01:14):
Okay, Okay, he's not resisting phone. Okay, you.
Speaker 3 (01:31):
Guys really don't need to be doing.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
All of that. During the arrest, Khalil's lawyer, Amy Greer,
spoke in the phone with one of the ICE agents
who said that they were acting on State Department orders
to revoke Khalil's student visa. Greer reiterated to the agents
that Khalil was in fact a permanent resident with a
(01:54):
green card, but the ICE agent just responded by saying
they were revoking the green card instead. Khalil's a graduate
student who has been studying at Columbia for over two years.
Last year, Khalil emerged as a visible figure in the
college encampment protests, becoming a public spokesperson and a lead
negotiator on behalf of Columbia University apartheid divest. Though never
(02:18):
being arrested, Khalil faced harassment from right wing Zionist docsing
campaigns calling for his deportation, and when ICE did come
for Khalil, disappearing him to a detention facility in Louisiana
and cutting him off from communication with his wife and lawyer.
Throughout all of this, he was not charged with any crime. Instead,
(02:38):
Ice in the State Department are using a rarely used
Cold War era immigration statute that gives the Secretary of
State the power to exclude or deport any non citizen
of the United States if there are quote reasonable grounds
to believe that in individual's entry, proposed activities, presence, or
activities in the United States would have quote potentially serious
(03:00):
adverse foreign policy consequences.
Speaker 3 (03:03):
Yeah, that was the one that like I remember at
the time, you and I were discussing this, like in
our group chat, and we were trying to work out
like how the Secretary of State could be revoking a
green card, like yeah, and I think you found this,
so you found it somewhere in it. The Trump administration
has been very very good at finding very obscure pieces
(03:24):
of law that it can wheeled against migrants. Right, Like,
no one in twenty sixteen would have foreseen what they
did with Title forty two, which is a public health law,
and they're doing something similar here. I mean, they may
have spent the last four years looking for these things,
es cecially when the campus protests began, but like, this
is entirely unprecedented as far as some were.
Speaker 2 (03:46):
And right if this happened like we discussed how this
case was probably going to be used as a testing
ground for employing these tactics on a more widespread scale,
creating legal precedent, and sure enough, Khalil's case was not
an outlier. This was just the first public instance of
the Trump administrations directed targeting of students they believed to
(04:08):
be associated with protests against Israel and its actions in Gaza,
and this wave of actions by ICE had actually already
begun before Khalil's arrest. The day before Khalil was arrested,
ICE agents knocked on the door of PhD student Rajani
Shrini Vassen, who a few days prior was suddenly notified
that her student visa had been revoked. When ICE agents knocked,
(04:30):
she did not answer the door. The next day, I
showed up again to her Columbia University apartment. Trinavassen was
not home, but upon hearing of Khalil's arrest just a
few hours later, she decided to quickly collect some belongings
and flee to Canada. Five days later, when ICE returned
to her residence, but this time with a warrant, Trinavassen
was already gone. Homeland Security Secretary Christy Nome praised this
(04:53):
as quote unquote self deportation.
Speaker 3 (04:55):
Yeah, they talk about this a lot, Like self deportation
is definitely one of their goals. They talked about it
before Trump even came into power. Like that's what we're
seeing a lot of these spectacle raids and and like
spectacle deportations gear tactics. Yeah, yeah, exactly the desires that
people leave. Is she a Canadian citizen or like I.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
Don't believe so, No, Okay, it was just the fastest
flight from LaGuardia out of the country, out of like,
you know, the closest, the closest she could be.
Speaker 3 (05:24):
Yeah, I wonder what her immigration states is in Canada now.
Speaker 2 (05:27):
She is currently figuring this whole situation out still, Okay,
navigating her legal options both in Canada and the States.
Speaker 3 (05:33):
Yeah, that'll be interesting too to see what Canada can
offer her. And like, I don't think the Trump administration
would go after like having her extradited back because if
she says she's not accused of a crime and then
they've kind of got what they wanted. It'll be interesting
to follow that.
Speaker 2 (05:47):
There is no need for extradition because none of the
people that were talking about today were choosed of any crime.
Speaker 3 (05:52):
Yeah, with the other cases of quote unquote like self deportation,
one of the issues is people have had their passport
seized and held, like like lots of Venice vigrants, so
they actually can't or it would be very difficult for
them to like just get on a fly and leave.
Speaker 2 (06:06):
Which I think is in part why she made the
decision to get out when she could.
Speaker 3 (06:10):
Right.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
DHS claimed in a statement that Trina Vasan advocated violence
and was quote involved in activities supporting hamas a terrorist
organization unquote. ICE is targeting her seemingly stems from being
mass arrested while trying to return to her apartment from
a picnic with friends on the same day as the
Hamilton Hill occupation. She couldn't get home and was caught
(06:33):
up in the crowd and was arrested among one hundred
other people. She received two summons for obstructing traffic and
failure to disperse, but her case was quickly dismissed. Homeland
Security claims that failing to declare these two summons is
what caused her visa to be revoked. Okay, interesting, that
(06:54):
same week ICE went after another Green card holder at Columbia,
a twenty one year old student named Yung Sam How. Chung,
a permanent resident who immigrated to the United States from
South Korea with her family when she was seven. On
March ninth, ICE agents visited her parents' home looking for Chung,
and that day she received an odd text message, reading, Hi, Yunsau,
This is Audrey from the police. My job is to
(07:16):
reach out to you and see if you have any
questions about your recent arrest and the process going forward.
When are you available for a phone call unquote. This
recent arrest was allegedly in reference to being detained, among
others at a sit in protest at Bernard College on
March fifth. Chung was charged and then released with misdemeanor obstruction.
(07:37):
After receiving that sketchy text message, Chung got an email
from Columbia Public Safety reading quote, the US Attorney's Office
for the Southern District of New York has asked us
to inform you that Homeland Security Investigation agents are seeking
to make contact with you in connection with an administrative
warrant for your arrest. Consistent with universities practice, we wanted
to share this information and their request with you. If
(07:59):
you are represented by counsel, it may make sense for
your lawyer to speak directly with DHS unquote. Chung's lawyer
decided to call quote unquote to Audrey from the police,
who revealed that she was actually an HSI agent and
that the State Department was revoking Miss Chung's residency status. Now,
rather than opting for self deportation or turning herself into
(08:21):
immigration authorities, Chung decided to go into hiding and fight
the deportation in the courts while trying to evade ised attention.
When Ice failed to locate her, they enlisted the help
of federal prosecutors. To quote from the New York Times quote,
on March tenth, Perry Carboni, a high ranking lawyer in
the Federal Prosecutor's office, told Miss Amaud, miss Chung's attorney,
(08:42):
that the Secretary of State, mister Rubio, had revoked Miss
Chung's visa. Miss amd responded that Miss Chung was not
in the country on a visa and was a permanent resident,
according to the lawsuit. Mister Carboni responded that mister Rubio
had quote revoked that as well, unquote. Yeah, so this
is the exact same language we saw with Khalil, and
(09:02):
it displays a general uncaring towards who they are actually
targeting and what their actual legal status is in the
United States. They think they're going after people's student visas,
but when it turns out they have green cards, that
doesn't stop them. They still continue to do it anyway.
On March thirteenth, Ice searched two residences on campus with warrants,
citing a statute for harboring non citizens, but Chung was
(09:24):
nowhere to be found. Like Khalil, the Trump administration is
arguing that her presence of the United States hinders the
administration's foreign policy agenda. But her lawyers note that Chung
was not, by any means a quote unquote movement leader.
She was simply one of hundreds of students who joined
in nationwide protests against Israel's actions in Gaza. Her lawyer's
(09:45):
right quote, Miss Chung has not made public statements to
the press or otherwise assumed a high profile role in
these protests. She was rather one of a large group
of college students raising, expressing, and discussing shared concerns unquote.
I had previously faced university disciplinary process which found she
was not in violation of any university policy related to protests.
(10:07):
Last year, Chung's lawyers filed a lawsuit to prevent her deportation,
claiming that ICE's actions against Chung are illegal and unconstitutional.
This lawsuit reads, quote, Officials at the highest echelon's government
are attempting to use immigration enforcement as a bludgeon to
suppress speech that they dislike, including Miss Chung's speech. ICE's
(10:28):
shocking actions against Miss Chung form part of a larger
pattern of attempted US government repression of constitutionally protected protest
activity and other forms of speech unquote. On March twenty fifth,
a federal judge granted a temporary restraining order halting efforts
from ICE to detain or relocate Chung. The judge said
(10:50):
that the government produced quote nothing in the record to
indicate Chung is a danger to the community or a
quote unquote foreign policy risk, or that she was in
any communication with terrorist organizations. The judge said that there
would be quote no trip to Louisiana here unquote. This
is in reference to the big iceed attention facility in Louisiana.
(11:13):
We'll be right back after this ad break, Okay. We're
back now. Although Chung has at least temporarily halted ICE's
efforts to detain or deporter, not all legal recourses have
(11:37):
proven successful. This week, a US district judge declined a
request to block the deportation of Cornell's student Mamadou Tall
after the State Department revoked his visa on March thirty first,
Tall released a statement, quote, given what we have seen
across the United States, I have lost faith that a
favorable ruling from the courts would guarantee my personal safety
(11:59):
and ability to express my beliefs. I've lost faith I
could walk the streets without being abducted. Weighing these options,
I took the decision to leave on my own terms.
Speaker 3 (12:10):
Yeah, it's pretty bleak.
Speaker 2 (12:12):
So Tall has elected for the quote unquote self deportation option,
at least for now. I believe his case is going
to continue, but he is not going to remain in
the United States.
Speaker 3 (12:22):
Yeah. I think he returned to the UK, right.
Speaker 2 (12:25):
I believe so. Yeah, he's a British citizen now. Interestingly,
last September, Cornell University itself tried to revoke Tall's student
visa for involvement in student protests but he successfully appealed
and was able to continue his African studies PhD remotely.
Speaker 3 (12:42):
Yeah. I spoke to him a little bit back then,
just FIA direct message, But I think at that time,
whatever his agreement was, it seems like there was a
component of it that at least he didn't want to
talk about it in public, which is fine. Everyone has
the right to do that, and he should do it
was best for himself. But maybe I'll try and follow
up with him again now see if he wants to speak,
because he seems to have like he's been of all
(13:03):
of these people at the one who's been able to
make the most statements and then control his narrative to
some degree. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (13:10):
No, he entered this period of like radio silence after
he won his appeal last fall, and then only started
speaking publicly again once he began getting targeted by the
Trump administration.
Speaker 3 (13:21):
Yeah, like the past month and a half. I think
he proactively filed that suit right like before.
Speaker 1 (13:26):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (13:27):
Yeah, Now, the scale that Mark Rubio and I start
seeking for in regards to deep ortations is seemingly going
to be increasingly large. On March twenty seventh, Secretary of
State Mark Rubio claimed that he has revoked over three
hundred student visas so far, saying at a press conference, quote,
we do it every day. Every time I find one
(13:49):
of these lunatics, I take away their visas unquote.
Speaker 3 (13:53):
Now there are a.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
Few ways the government is currently trying to find these
quote unquote lunatics. I used to seem to be targeting
non citizens who have been arrested or detained at Palestine protests,
even if their charges were subsequently dropped. This is the
case for Chung and Shriny Vawsen, as well as former
student Leca Cordia, a Palestinian who was arrested at Columbia
(14:14):
campus protests in April of twenty twenty four She's currently
being held in an ice attention facility in Texas. Now
beyond arrest records, the government is utilizing the World Wide
Web and social media to identify new and returning visa
applicants and possibly current visa holders that quote support terrorist
(14:35):
organizations unquote. Social media screening of immigrants and visa holders
has been slowly ramping up since twenty fourteen and accelerated
during Trump's first term, but a new directive from Secretary
of State Mark Rubio titled enhanced screening and social media
vetting for visa applicants was sent out on March twenty
fifth and leaked by journalist Ken Klippenstein. The directive cites
(14:58):
two executive orders from Trump measures to combat anti Semitism
end quote protecting the United States from foreign terrorists and
other national security and public safety threats. The State Department
is now requiring consular officers to conduct a quote unquote
mandatory social media review with screenshotting for students and student
(15:19):
exchange visitors with the intent of looking for evidence of
quote advocating for, sympathizing with, or persuading others to endorse
or espouse terrorist activities or support a designated foreign terrorist
organization quote. Now this applies to FM and J visas,
so student exchange visas, academic visas, and vocational visas. The
(15:40):
directive also instructs officers to search social media for quote
conduct that bears a hostile attitude towards US citizens or
US culture, including government institutions or founding principles unquote, which
is kind of the most incredibly broad thing I've ever
s scene.
Speaker 3 (16:00):
Yeah, I mean, that's leaving it at the create discretion
of the officer, right, there's.
Speaker 2 (16:05):
Already been an instance of a US customers agent's denying
entry to someone who had quote unquote anti Trump sentiments
found on their phone. Now, though this new directive is
focused on denying or revoking student visas, the Department of
Homeland Security is seeking to expand its social media data
collection to US citizenship, green card, and asylum applicants, basically
(16:29):
anyone and everyone in the US immigration system, no matter
their current status or what previous vetting they might have
already gone through.
Speaker 3 (16:36):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
On March fifth, DHS issued a sixty day notice for
public comment on a proposal for quote uniform of vetting
standards and national security screening unquote that includes the collection
of social media information for all non citizens applying for
immigration benefits like citizenship or permanent residency. A statement from
the US Citizenship and Immigration Service reads, quote, these efforts
(16:59):
ensure that those seeking immigration benefits to live and work
in the United States do not threaten public safety, undermine
national security, or promote harmful anti American ideologies unquote.
Speaker 3 (17:12):
Yeah, Like the anti American ideologies again is just fastly broad.
Speaker 2 (17:15):
Right, It's like crazy red scare level stuff.
Speaker 3 (17:18):
Yeah, and I'm guessing this will be either like a
literal control f of whatever they can find of your
public social media or aif that's some kind of AI assistant.
That's what it seems to be, right, Like.
Speaker 2 (17:30):
Former immigration agents have suggested that they're probably going to
use some AI system for this, as they've already kind
of used more primitive versions, but ramping up to this
scale and with like this increased focus and like attention
on quote unquote AI is going to affect the way
that they do this betting process. Absolutely, yeah, great. So
though the government is trying to increase their social media
(17:52):
screening so far, they actually haven't had to do that
much of their own research to identify targets for removal.
On March seventeenth, a Georgetown scholar named Bdar Khan Suri
was arrested by Homeland Security outside his home in Virginia,
where he lives with his wife, who's a US citizen,
and their three kids. According to Surrey's lawyer, masked agents
(18:14):
quote refused to tell him the basis for the arrest,
handcuffed him, and forced him into an unmarked black SUV. Later,
his wife was informed that her husband's visa was revoked
based on social media posts. And that Surrey was sent
to ice attention in Louisiana. Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Trisha
(18:34):
McLoughlin posted on x that Surrey was quote actively spreading
Hamas propaganda and promoting anti Semitism on social media. The
Secretary of State issued a determination that Surrey's activities and
presents in the United States rendered him deportable unquote. Of course,
any single post in support of Palestine is going to
(18:56):
be seen as quote unquote promoting antisemitism. According to Mark Rubio,
Surrey's lawyer wrote in a court filing, quote, doctor Surrey
is an academic, not an activist, but he spoke out
on social media about his views on the Israel Gazo war.
Even more so, his wife is an outspoken critic of
the Israeli government and the violence it has perpetuated against
(19:17):
Palestinians unquote. Yet see that he was identified through his wife, right, correct,
and we'll get to that.
Speaker 3 (19:23):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (19:24):
Surrey has no criminal record, and according to a colleague,
he did not attend campus protests. However, Surrey's lawyer writes
that his family have been victims of a docsing campaign,
with his wife stating that a website had quote claimed
falsely that my husband and I have quote ties to
Hamas unquote. The Homeland Security Assistant Secretary references that claim
in a public statement on Twitter. And this harassment stems
(19:47):
in part from Surrey's father in law being a maud Yusef,
a former advisor to Hamas. A federal judge blocked Suri's
deportation as immigration court proceedings continue. But he's still means
in iced attention.
Speaker 3 (20:01):
What kind of visa was he on?
Speaker 2 (20:04):
He's not a green card holder. He received his visa
to continue doctoral research on peace building in Iraq and Afghanistan.
It's some kind of like academic or exchange visa. I
don't think we know the exact type that he has.
Speaker 3 (20:18):
Okay, yeah, that would be like it would be interesting
to know if like, are they searching just through F
one visa databases or are they said I mean obviously
not if they're finding these green card people, but.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
Like, well, I think specifically in this case, they're searching
social media. They're not searching through their own databases. They
don't care what kind of visa he has. They're looking
at this docksing campaign that's been targeted at him and
his family for like over a year and using that
as the basis to deport him.
Speaker 3 (20:46):
Right, and then being like, can we deport he's not
a citizen?
Speaker 2 (20:50):
So yes, basically even though his wife is a citizen.
Speaker 3 (20:52):
Yeah, it's children publy therefore also citizens.
Speaker 2 (20:55):
His wife who's whose father is a mod yusef they
can't deport her because she's a citizen or at least
they can't abort her right now. Who knows if they'll
try to denaturalize in the future. Yeah, but this is
the easiest person to target.
Speaker 3 (21:08):
Yeah, And I think that's kind of what they're going for. Like,
a lot of this is it's like the politics of
owning the Libs, Right, It's like the politics of being
angry at your niece and nephew on Facebook and wanting
to humiliate them.
Speaker 2 (21:24):
Like.
Speaker 3 (21:24):
It's not a particularly lately coherent policy other than like
the Palestine protests made a lot of people on the
right mad and they don't like migrants, and that now
they're using this obscure legal provision as a cudgel against
everything they dislike.
Speaker 2 (21:41):
Yeah, and using social media to identify people who have
never been arrested, never been charged with anything. Yeah, we're
going to finish our discussion on these docing campaigns and
ICE action starking students after.
Speaker 3 (21:53):
This ad break. All right, we're back, So right.
Speaker 2 (22:06):
Now, the two main vectors for iceed attention whether you
have a green card or a visa, seems to be
previous arrests or these mass doxing campaigns. Now, someone like
Mahmoud Khalil was never arrested or charged with the crime,
but instead has been the target of harassment from both
a local campus doxing account run by Columbia professors and
(22:27):
fellow students, as well as larger right wing Zionist organizations
like Canary Mission. A few days before being arrested by ICE,
Canary Mission posted a video naming Khalil as a quote
unquote siren mog suspected foreign national alert. So what is
Canary Mission? If you're lucky enough to be unaware? Since
(22:48):
twenty fifteen, Canary Mission has been collecting and publishing a
personal information of people they accuse of promoting quote hatred
of the United States, Israel, and Jews on a North
American college campus and beyond unquote. Now they have profiles
for a few legitimate American neo Nazis, but many profiles
(23:09):
only cite criticism of the Israeli government and its actions
in Gaza as proof of alleged anti Semitism. And now
there is increasing evidence that the government is using websites
like Canary Mission to target students, professors, and scholars for
ICE deportation, essentially outsourcing intail gathering from these pro Israel
non government organizations. A few weeks ago, Canary Mission uploaded
(23:33):
a profile for Rumesa oz Turk, a Turkish graduate student
at Tufts University. They included a picture her resume and
linked to an op ed she co wrote last year
for her student paper criticizing the university for its ties
to Israel amidst the war in Gaza. For this, the
Canary Mission claimed oz Turk quote engaged in anti Israel
(23:55):
activism unquote. Two weeks later, while walking along to if
Tar dinner for Ramadan, a plane clothes ICE agent approached
oz Turk on the sidewalk. As he grabbed her arms
and wrestled away her phone, five more agents surrounded her
and pulled up their gator masks as neighbors began filming
the arrest. Within twenty four hours, she was moved to
(24:17):
ICE attention in Louisiana. A statement from Homeland Security claimed
that HSI Homeland Security Investigation had determined that oz Turk
quote engaged in activities in support of hamas a foreign
terrorist organization that relishes the killing of Americans, and Secretary
of State Mark Rubio said, quote, we gave you a
visa to come and study and get a degree, not
(24:40):
to become a social activist that tears up our university campuses.
Speaker 3 (24:44):
Unquote. Yeah, I mean again, like writing an op ed
is like as central to the First Amendment as things
can be.
Speaker 2 (24:52):
Right, Yeah, there's no evidence she was even attending campus protests,
let alone r tearing up tearing up the university. She
co wrote an op ed, And you should not be
deported for engaging in protest on a university campus at all. Right,
this is flatantly unconstitutional, extremely worrying. The fact that this
person just got a profile in the Canary Mission website
(25:15):
for writing an op ed and then this is used
as justification for her deportation is still like an even
greater escalation.
Speaker 3 (25:22):
Yeah, Like if we're talking about like this is sort
of like liberal idea of the marketplace of ideas, right,
Like the way that the ideas enter the marketplace, like,
you will find nothing more amenable to liberalism than writing
an op ed in your campus newspaper. Right, that is
the most like well behaved, straight down the middle, constitutionally
(25:43):
protected thing way to engage in anti genocide activism, pro
Palestine activism. So like in a sense, this one is
particularly disturbing, like a a frontal assault on First Amendment
rise for non citizens is what it is. Yes.
Speaker 2 (25:58):
On March twenty fourth, Canary Misis published a new section
of their website titled Uncovering Foreign Nationals, which lists the
profiles of non citizens who they believe qualify for deportation.
Speaker 3 (26:12):
Jesus.
Speaker 2 (26:14):
Another far right pro Israel docs in group called Batar,
which even the ADL lists as an extremist group, which
is wild. Baitar says that they have given the Trump
administration a deportation list of thousands of names, including citizens
that they expect to be denaturalized. People like Mamadoo Tall
(26:34):
and Mahmoud Khalil have been targeted by both of these organizations.
Speaker 3 (26:39):
People will be familiar with. I don't know if it's
Bitar or Bitar, but like you probably have seen videos
of them on campus trying to hand pages to people pagers.
Speaker 2 (26:48):
Yeah, like making light of the pager attack Israel.
Speaker 3 (26:52):
Did I mean making a threat? Like sure, Like if
you're going to come onto a campus and make a
fucking bomb threat and accused someone else of terrorism. I
mean the hypocrisy is kind of the point.
Speaker 2 (27:04):
But or even just like you know, quote unquote celebrating
the deaths of people, right.
Speaker 3 (27:08):
Yeah, right, like mocking this attack which killed children, which
you know, crippled people. It's just disgusting. It's like just important.
They seem to get a lot of attention online because
they do the thing where they go up to people
and say deliberately provocative things and then film their reactions. Right,
they're kind of irl trolling.
Speaker 2 (27:32):
The past week, ICE actions against students have seemingly accelerated.
Ali Reza Drudi, a doctoral student from Iran studying at
the University of Alabama, was arrested by ICE on March
twenty fifth in the middle of the night at his
off campus apartment. Drudi's the entry visa expired, but he
was allowed to stay in the States as he still
maintained his student's status. Yeah, it's unknown why exactly he
(27:56):
was targeted. He has no ties to protests or any
notable online footprint.
Speaker 3 (28:01):
It could be his ethnic origin, right leg, Yeah, it
could be his name, right yeah. But that we should
explain the status thing a bit more for people who
aren't familiar. So like, sure, your status is when you're
in good standing with the university. So normally that means
you need to be enrolled in twelve credits per You
might be on semesters, you might be on courters. I
don't think it's usually matters you have to there's a
(28:23):
minimum course load. It may be different for different systems.
I don't know. You'd also need to be in good
standing in terms of like not lay on your fees
or your tuition fees, that kind of stuff, right not
in any you haven't been expelled or excluded from the
university for any actions that you've taken, that kind of thing.
It means you are currently a student at the university. Basically,
(28:44):
the only time this normally affects international students that I'm
aware of as a person who now teaches students is
like they can't drop below a certain courseload, when otherwise
they may wish to drop below a certain courseload to
either focus on they might have like a research position.
They might be doing other stuff on campus like taing. Right,
Sometimes that ta and counts towards their course, so sometimes
(29:05):
it doesn't, but it can affect things like that. But
generally it would be the university that would update that status. Right,
that would notify US Customs and Immigration if somebody fell
out of compliance with that. If I'm hearing right, that
doesn't seem like that's what happened here, right.
Speaker 2 (29:24):
No, Simply his entry visa expired, so if he left
the country, he then would have to get another visa
to get back, but he can stay as long as
he still has his valid student status. So not only
is ICE trying to revoke these like visas, but they're
trying to essentially say that by revoking these visas, they
are also attempting to strip them of their student status,
(29:46):
which is like a separate like step. These things can
get kind of very very blurry though.
Speaker 3 (29:52):
Yeah, Like I don't quite know how that works in
terms of like our ICE supposed to be able to
I don't think it hugely matters at this.
Speaker 2 (29:59):
Technically, the State Department does have that ability, but it's
under the same like Foreign policy risk designation, Okay, and
they'll justify it by saying, well, his visa already expired,
so we're just removing him because his visa expired, even
though that's not really how this works.
Speaker 3 (30:15):
Yeah, then they don't have to remove him for that reason.
But yeah, in this case, I guess they've go for
something else.
Speaker 2 (30:21):
No, because the University of Alabama did not elect to
rescind his student status. He was a student in good standing, Yeah,
and thus legally allowed in the United States.
Speaker 3 (30:32):
Yeah. Yeah, like everyone else here, he hadn't done anything
that would, under normal circumstances lead him having any interactions
with USCIS.
Speaker 2 (30:42):
Just this last week, I sttained a University of Minnesota
grad student at their off campus housing. The university released
a statement saying that they had no prior knowledge of
this incident and had not shared any information with federal authorities.
This person's name is still not released.
Speaker 3 (30:58):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (30:59):
Last week, a student udent at the Southern Illinois University
had their visa revoked. The school administration told their college
paper that the university has no role in the visa
revocation process. The Illinois Governor's office is working with schools
across the state to quote ensure they are being vigilant
about what's happening on their respective campuses. The Governor's team
(31:19):
has asked universities to communicate with international students about the
general resources available to them through the institution. In addition,
we have suggested that they connect impacted students with legal
resources that have been in place for several years. According
to a statement sent to the university paper, The Daily
Egyptian Tina Sickinger, which is a very cool name, the
(31:43):
school's director of International Student and Scholar Services sent an
email to the international student body of Southern Illinois University
advising them to carry photocopies of immigration documents with them
at all times, as well as proof of enrollment and
records of US residences. The email recommended that students quote
use caution on social media and exercise discretion when participating
(32:07):
in political demonstrations or protests unquote, warning that though protests
should be protected speech quote, such activities can sometimes be
misinterpreted and make carry risks to your immigration status unquote. Unfortunately,
I think this is the university trying to look out
for these students.
Speaker 3 (32:24):
Yeah, that's the best you could expect from them, really.
Speaker 2 (32:28):
And they are providing like legal resources to these students,
but they're essentially saying like you shouldn't post anything or
do any protests because then ice might come kidnap you. Yeah,
which is just a fucked up situation to be in,
and like yeah, they don't have like any other ability
to like stop this right now. I am curious what
Prisker is going to continue to do here though.
Speaker 3 (32:49):
Yeah, I mean, none of what they've said is like wrong,
It's kind of what you can expect from university. The
best you can expect from the university really is like, hey,
we've noticed it's happening.
Speaker 2 (33:01):
So that is the situation as it currently stands. I
do have one final tidbit here just that highlights the
absurdity of this whole situation. On March twenty fourth, a
lawsuit on behalf of Israeli Columbia students and relatives of
Israeli October seventh victims was filed against Columbia Jewish Voice
for Peace and Students for Justice in Palestine, Columbia University
(33:24):
Apartheid divest and individual Columbia students, including Mahmoud Khalil. The
lawsuit allege is that these Colombia groups and students are
the domestic propaganda arm of Hamas, and even claims that
these groups had advanced notice that the October seventh attack
was going to take place.
Speaker 3 (33:42):
Oh, come on.
Speaker 2 (33:44):
So the plan was kept secret among Hamas's own political
allies in the region, but they gave an Ivy League
university in the New York City.
Speaker 3 (33:55):
It had to tip off. They just let him know
what was coming.
Speaker 2 (33:59):
Completely absurd.
Speaker 3 (34:00):
The absolutely like like the IDF completely failed to see
this coming, right, But they're not the folks at the
Ivy League universities who were who were ready and waiting.
Speaker 2 (34:10):
Hamas didn't tell the who thies, They didn't tell Iran,
they didn't tell Hesbola, but they told student activist groups
in New York City at the Columbia University campus.
Speaker 3 (34:23):
Yeah, absolutely ludicrous. Like I eagerly await this this court case.
I guess to see what evidence they have of this.
The evidence is going to be like someone had a
Palestinian flag.
Speaker 2 (34:34):
Some of the quote unquote evidence that they that they
allege is that some of these like activist accounts had
a renewed activity in October of twenty twenty three, like
before the attack happened. But this is just a simple coincidence.
Obviously these people did not have a heads up that
the October seventh attack was going to take place.
Speaker 3 (34:55):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (34:56):
The lawsuit also argues that protest activity is not First
Amendment protected speech, but in fact, quote substantial assistance in
the form of propaganda and recruiting services and in coordination
with a designated foreign terrorist organization, again alleging there's some
kind of communication between Hobmas and student activists in New
(35:17):
York City.
Speaker 3 (35:17):
Yeah, this is ludicrous. Like, one of the reasons that
maybe we're seeing this so much over the Palestine advocacy
is that HAMAS is a listed foreign terrorist organization. Many
other groups and lots of groups in that part of
the world are, But like it's just a bigger stick
to wave I guess material aid or that no one
has been actually accused of material aid to foreign terrorist
(35:39):
organization as far as I'm aware, But like that is
kind of the sort of stick that they're waving, right,
that is the thing that they're alleging.
Speaker 2 (35:47):
I will end us with just this kind of final note. Now,
while there are little signs that this would happen at
a scale this large and disfocused under a democratic president,
a degree of consent for this type of targeting was
manufactured the past year as it relates to Palestine protests,
with some liberals and democratic politicians associating activists as pro
(36:09):
hamas terrorists. And this is the consequence of that public
perception building and the consent being manufactured for that framing.
And now that the even more evil side is in charge,
they can take that justification and run with it way
further than what a Joe Biden or a Kamala Harris
would have done. So it is far worse, but it's
not in a political bubble. This has been like a
(36:31):
growing project for the past few years.
Speaker 3 (36:34):
There was no point at which to Biden administration really
like effusively said, this is protected First Amendment speech. Yeah,
we may not like it, but it is central to
the Bill of Rights. It's central to what America is
supposed to be about.
Speaker 2 (36:47):
They never defended the constitutionality of this speech. Yeah, Nor
would they have intervened to stop the deportation of someone
like Tall if Cornell decided to revoke his status, right right, Yeah,
I don't think they buy an administration or a Kamala
Harris administration would be directed in these these universities to
take that action themselves, nor would they be I think,
(37:07):
revoking student visas at skill like this, No, but they
would have let Ice do the stuff that Ice does
if universities themselves elect to remove student visas or unenroll
these students. And like a degree of the complacency here
is placed on the actual university administrations, the university staff,
who have been vilifying these protesters for the past two years.
Speaker 3 (37:31):
Yeah, and I mean in some cases, right, like I'm
thinking of one of Colombia, Like professors have got away
with things which are absolutely unacceptable and like one hundred
percent in some violation of your agreement with the university
as a member of the faculty, like doxing your students. Yeah,
photographing students without their consent, following students around like absolutely unacceptable,
(37:56):
Like in any other context that you would be immediately
shit canned, Like really, really, the only reason you can
lose ten ure seemingly is being a fucking creep to
students or stealing a lot of money. And like universities
did allow that for more than a year under the
Biden administration, and like we're seeing the consequences of that now.
Speaker 2 (38:16):
It's also worth noting that since I've had to quote
from so many government statements this episode, the Trump admin
is continuing to correlate any expression of sympathy or solidarity
with Palestine as explicit support for Hamas. Basically, anything you
say that's critical of the Israeli government its actions in
Gaza are being interpreted by the Trump administration as anti
(38:39):
Semitism and support for the October seventh massacre. This is
a false equivalency. What the government alleges should not be
automatically taken as the truth. These tactics have been used
for years to broadly smear pro Palestine activists while also
hurting anti Zionist Jews. And I guess like, finally, we
are not necess necessarily endorsing every single thing that every
(39:03):
single one of these students has said. We do not
necessarily agree with the framing of every single sentence that
they have said.
Speaker 3 (39:09):
Yeah, I mean, we don't know everything that they've said.
Speaker 2 (39:12):
We can, yeah, exactly. This is like completely separate to that.
Speaker 3 (39:15):
Yeah, it doesn't matter, Like we are defending their right
to engage in constitutionally protected to speaking.
Speaker 2 (39:20):
Correct no matter what they're saying, no matter if they
have opinions on Hamas, that differ from ours. No matter
what they are saying at a campus protest, it should
not result in ICE targeting them and hunting them down
and forcing students who attend to sit in protests into
hiding to defend their own rights and to keep their
green cards. This is like a completely absurd and like
(39:43):
blatantly fascist to use the now overused word frankly, but
this is like this is this is what that is.
If this was happening in China, this was happening in Russia,
in other countries, people would be very very quick to
call out.
Speaker 3 (39:57):
I mean, it does happen in Russia, right people, exactly?
People just yeah, yeah, And the State Department of this
country has called it out right like it at rightly.
I don't agree with everything the State Department does, but
they do agree with him on that, like yeah, And
I think this is like I know, if you find
yourself having a discussion about this, I think almost everyone
(40:18):
in America can find something that they disagree with the
government on or have disagreed with the government on, and
like this hurts every single one of us, right, like
everyone's right to freedom of speech is challenged. When someone's
right to freedom of speech is challenged, and like, I
think that is the way to approach this. It doesn't
really matter if the people whose speech is being challenged
(40:41):
right now, their speech is if it's odious to us,
if it's something that we don't agree with, Like that
isn't what's at stake. What's at stake is everyone's right
to say everything without government consequences.
Speaker 2 (40:53):
Well, I think that doesn't for us today. At it
could happen here. We will continue to report on utar
getting of students, scholars and professors, and immigrants in general
as the Trump administration ramps up its deportation efforts. If
you would like to contact us about these topics, we
have an encrypted email address at cool Zone tips at
(41:16):
proton dot me. It is end to end encrypted, so
if you use another encrypted email service or another proton
mail account to send the email only, then is it encrypted.
Speaker 1 (41:31):
It could Happen Here is a production or cool Zone Media.
For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website
Coolzonemedia dot com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can
now find sources for it could Happen here listed directly
in episode descriptions. Thanks for listening,
Behind the Bastards News
Host
Robert Evans
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