DHS Detains Palestinian Student from Columbia Encampment

Agents told him his student visa was revoked. But he had a green card. Agents then said that was revoked too.

Mahmoud Khalil outside the gates of Columbia University’s campus on April 30, 2024. Photo by USA TODAY Network via Getty Images

On Saturday, Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officers detained Mahmoud Khalil – a recent Columbia University graduate who helped lead the Gaza solidarity encampment – at his New York City home, an apartment building owned by the school, says advocates.

According to the advocates, at around 8:30 PM, Khalil and his wife – who is eight months pregnant – had just unlocked the door to their building when two plainclothes DHS agents pushed inside behind them. The agents allegedly did not identify themselves at first, instead asking for Khalil’s identity before detaining him.

The agents proceeded to tell Khalil’s wife that if she did not leave her husband and go to their apartment, they would arrest her too. The agents claimed that the State Department had revoked Khalil’s student visa, with one agent presenting what he claimed was a warrant on his cell phone. But Khalil, according to advocates, has a green card. Khalil’s wife went to their apartment to get the green card.

“He has a green card,” an agent apparently said on the phone, confused by the matter. But then after a moment, the agent claimed that the State Department had “revoked that too.”

Meanwhile, Khalil had been on the phone with his attorney, Amy Greer, who was trying to intervene, asking why he was being detained, if they had a warrant, and explaining that Khalil was a green card holder. The attorney had circled back to demanding to see a warrant when the agents apparently instead hung up the phone.

Khalil is currently being held in an ICE detention center in Louisiana, per the ICE detainee tracker.

“We will vigorously be pursuing Mahmoud’s rights in court, and will continue our efforts to right this terrible and inexcusable – and calculated – wrong committed against him,” Greer said in a statement.

DHS initially referred Zeteo to the White House, which did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Later, DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin confirmed in a statement that ICE detained Khalil “in support of President Trump’s executive orders prohibiting anti-Semitism.” Without providing evidence, McLaughlin claimed Khalil “led activities aligned to Hamas.”

Secretary of State Marco Rubio wrote on social media: “We will be revoking the visas and/or green cards of Hamas supporters in America so they can be deported.”

A State Department spokesperson told Zeteo they cannot comment on individual visa cases, but "in general, the department has broad authority to revoke visas … under the Immigration and Nationality Act.”

The department “exercise[s] that authority when information comes to light at any time indicating that a visa holder may be inadmissible to the United States or otherwise ineligible for a visa,” the spokesperson added.

Free Speech?

Khalil, who is Palestinian, served as a lead negotiator amid the campus’s Gaza solidarity encampment last spring. He had appeared in several media interviews in the past, telling outlets he had a student visa. Advocates say he had gotten his green card since.

The escalation comes amid several reports of ICE presence on the school’s campus this week. It also comes after a massive escalation by the Trump-Vance administration to crack down on speech. This week, Trump announced his intentions to jail, imprison, or deport students involved in protests. Then, reporting revealed that his State Department was planning to use artificial intelligence to monitor online activity, and revoke visas for whomever they deem to be “pro-Hamas.”

On Friday, the Trump administration cut $400 million in grants to Columbia, claiming it has failed to take steps to address antisemitism, despite it having one of the most militant responses to student protesters.

In February – after Columbia president Katrina Armstrong met with Israel’s education minister, where they discussed taking firmer action on campus speech – Columbia’s Barnard College expelled three students for political activism for the first time since the 1968 protests. This week – as the school welcomed former Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, who once said, “I’ve killed many Arabs in my life, and there’s no problem with that,” to campus – NYPD arrested nine students involved in a campus sit-in.

All the while, Columbia is maintaining a shadowy process to discipline students who are critical of Israel, including, apparently for writing op-eds.

Khalil himself said he was accused of misconduct by the school just weeks before his graduation this December. “I have around 13 allegations against me, most of them are social media posts that I had nothing to do with,” he told the Associated Press last week. The school put a hold on his transcript and apparently threatened to block him from graduating. But, according to Khalil, when he appealed the decision with a lawyer, the school eventually backed down.

“They just want to show Congress and right-wing politicians that they’re doing something, regardless of the stakes for students,” Khalil told the AP. “It’s mainly an office to chill pro-Palestine speech.”

A Shift in Policy?

It is not yet clear if Columbia explicitly welcomed ICE and DHS onto its campus. But the school has recently issued guidance on “potential visits to campus” by ICE. While it encourages campus affiliates to contact the school’s public safety office if they see ICE activity on campus, it says faculty and staff “should not interfere,” for instance, in “exigent circumstances” where ICE agents seek access to university buildings or people without a warrant.

In at least one email seen by Zeteo, the guidance was emailed to some students on Saturday – the day Khalil was detained.

Columbia University did not answer Zeteo’s specific questions about Khalil’s detention and whether it had changed its policies regarding allowing immigration authorities on campus. In a public statement, the university said, “Columbia has and will continue to follow the law. Consistent with our longstanding practice and the practice of cities and institutions throughout the country, law enforcement must have a judicial warrant to enter non-public University areas, including University buildings.”

The school even accepting “potential visits to campus” by immigration officers seem a far cry from Trump’s first term. In November 2016, the Columbia administration, led by president and First Amendment scholar Lee Bollinger, declared that the school would not allow immigration officials on campus without a warrant – nor share student information unless subpoenaed, ordered by the court, or authorized by the student.

Prem Thakker is Zeteo’s political reporter. Send tips via email or Signal (premthakker.35).

Editor’s note: This story has been updated with additional details throughout.