Turkish student freed after 6 weeks in ICE custody has 'faith' in US judicial system
- Rumeysa Ozturk was arrested March 25 after the State Department revoked her student visa.
- The Trump administration has stepped up a campaign to deport pro-Palestinian campus activists.
A Turkish student seized by masked, plainclothes Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents on a street near her home outside Boston was back at Tufts University on Sunday after spending over six weeks at an immigration detention center in Louisiana.
Rumeysa Ozturk, who had spoken out against the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza, was arrested March 25 after the State Department revoked her student visa. A judge ordered her immediately released on Friday.
"America is the best democracy in the world, and I believe in those values we share," she told reporters Saturday. "I have faith in the American system of justice."
The Trump administration has stepped up a campaign to deport pro-Palestinian campus activists. Ozturk, 30, was arrested after co-writing an opinion piece criticizing the university's response to calls by students to divest from companies with ties to Israel and to "acknowledge the Palestinian genocide."
A senior Department of Homeland Security spokesperson told Paste BN after Ozturk was taken into custody that a visa is a "privilege, not a right." The spokesperson, who declined to be identified, said "glorifying and supporting terrorists who kill Americans" is grounds to terminate a visa, calling it "common-sense security."
While in detention, Ozturk wrote about the "inhumane" and unsafe conditions. She says she had limited access to food, had to wait hours for toilet paper and didn't getting proper treatment for her asthma at the ICE facility in Pine Prairie, Louisiana.
After her release, Ozturk thanked the professors, students and "so many lovely people" who sent her letters of encouragement.
"Please don't forget all the wonderful women in the immigration detention systems," she said. "I was so tired of witnessing cries and pain that can all be preventable."
Mudassar Toppa, staff attorney at CLEAR, a legal non-profit aiding Ozturk's defense, said the former Fulbright Scholar "should not have spent even one minute incarcerated."
“Make no mistake, the government tried to punish Ms. Ozturk for lending her pen to advocacy for Palestinian human rights," Toppa said. "The court's decision ... is not only a victory for Ms. Ozturk, but everyone who wishes to advocate for Palestinian human rights without fear of retaliation."
Contributing: Fernando Cervantes Jr.