Three Massachusetts lawmakers are demanding answers after visiting the ICE detention facility in Louisiana that is currently holding a Tufts University and Columbia University student.
Rümeysa Öztürk, 30, a Tufts University doctoral student from Turkey, and Mahmoud Kahlil, a Palestinian activist from Columbia University, were both detained by federal immigration authorities in March.
On Tuesday, Congresswomen Ayanna Pressley, Senator Ed Markey, and Congressman Jim McGovern toured both the Basile and Jena immigration detention facilities currently housing both students.
“Rümeysa Öztürk is my constituent, an accomplished scholar, and a valued member of our Massachusetts community,” Congresswoman Pressley said. “We’re in Louisiana to demand answers, shine a light on this damning violation of their constitutional rights, and call for their immediate release. Our destinies are tied, and we will not allow these abuses of power to go unchecked.”
The lawmakers met directly with both detainees, along with another asylum-seeker from New Orleans and El Salvador, who reportedly never returned from a check-in with ICE last month.
Authorities
alleged that Ozturk engaged in activities supporting the terrorist group Hamas
and revoked her visa.
In an
arrest caught on camera
, Ozturk was surrounded by a group of masked federal agents in plain clothes as she walked along a street near her off-campus apartment on March 25.
In less than 24 hours, she was transported from
Massachusetts to New Hampshire to Vermont, then down to an Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center in Basile, Louisiana
, where she’s been jailed for more than three weeks.
Kahlil was arrested “in support of President Trump’s executive orders prohibiting anti-Semitism,”
according to a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson
.
Last week
, Ozturk was deemed a “danger to the community” by a federal immigration court and denied bond.
Earlier this month, a
Vermont judge ordered that Ozturk not be deported until he can rule on her case.
Her lawyers want her case moved to Vermont from Louisiana.
Ozturk is among
several people with ties to American universities
whose visas were revoked or have been stopped from entering the U.S. after they were accused of attending demonstrations or publicly expressing support for Palestinians.
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