This month marks the one-year anniversary of Mahmoud Khalil’s arrest, a moment that seemingly kicked off an increased wave of government suppression against the Palestine movement.
Khalil, who was finally released from detention last June, spoke with Mondoweiss U.S. correspondent Michael Arria about the status of his case, the media’s attacks on him, and the case of Leqaa Kordia.
Mondoweiss: I wanted to start by discussing the current status of your case. Where are things right now?
Khalil: The current legal picture is genuinely precarious. In January 2026, the Court of Appeals issued a divided ruling saying that the New Jersey federal court, that had initially found my detention to be unconstitutional, did not have jurisdiction and that [go through the] immigration system first before a federal court can weigh in on the constitutional questions about my detention.
The problem is that the immigration court is fully controlled by the Trump administration. There isn’t an “immigration judge.” They are just employees of the Department of Justice appointed by the attorney general that’s appointed by the president himself.
So this could be dangerous to me and and actually to others, because the stakes go far beyond me, as this case would determine whether the government can detain a lawful resident for political speech. [There are implications] for every non-citizen in the country. You may be detained in ICE detention for for months or years before you can go to a federal court and challenge your detention.
Of course, one year in, the government has still not charged me with any crime or presented any evidence of wrongdoing. So that’s why the charges keep changing. First, a foreign policy statute used almost never before, the Rubio determination, and then the [accusations of] green card fraud, which are baseless. So that’s like explains the shifting.
But in short, I would like to say there are two parallel tracks that are running simultaneously. We have the immigration court track. So after the foreign policy justification was challenged in court, the administration shifted to a new argument, which is that I lied on my green card by omitting some work and internships at university. Those claims are baseless, mere fabrications.
Just recently, the legal team has appealed that ruling to the Board of Immigration Appeals, which is, again, totally controlled by the Trump administration.
On the federal court track, regardless of what happens in the immigration process, the federal court’s order prohibiting my detention and deportation is still remains in effect. Now we are appealing the January 15 decision, and we’re asking for a rehearing by the full court. We’re not sure about the timeline of that. It could be in a month, we would hear back from them. It could be six months. But basically, we’re fighting this at every step.
The Trump administration is waging lawfare against me by appealing everything and trying to bring new things, which makes it little bit like difficult.
This month marks the year anniversary of your abduction by ICE. That occurred at the height of the student protests over Gaza, and you were a lead negotiator at Columbia. Do you think the movement has changed since that moment? Has anything surprised you about how it’s potentially shifted, or the backlash to it?
I believe the main objective of targeting me was to make an example out of me and to chill speech across the country.
That’s, I believe, why, the Trump administration came after a few individuals. To prove they can come after people if they stand up for Palestine or if they speak out about issues that [the Trump administration doesn’t] like. So that was the intention, I believe.
In some ways, they succeeded. A lot of international students, even citizens, professors, journalists are now fearing to talk about certain topics because they don’t want to be targeted by this administration. So, it worked on some level.
However, I believe the pushback that my arrest and other students’ arrests received was tremendous. We’ve seen people, beyond just the Palestine movement, mobilizing for our cases because this administration is going after the First Amendment, going after the right of free speech throughout the country. This should concern everyone in this country, whether they agree with me on Palestine or they don’t agree with me on Palestine.
The movement is having to deal with a new administration, so there are new variables they have to deal with. It’s not like the Biden administration, where you would protest because you think they may change. The Trump administration is too stubborn and too cruel to change because of the protests, which I think explains some of the decline in protests.
But I feel like public opinion, and the mainstream has shifted. This is clear. There’s a new Gallup poll [showing more Americans sympathize with Palestinians than Israelis], so the change is happening. That explains the vicious attack by this administration, by the Zionist establishment in this country against students, against pro-Palestine speech in this country. They know that Palestine is becoming [a bigger] issue for a lot of people in and in this country.
There’s obviously been consistent attacks on you from pro-Israel groups and members of the media. New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdan just you for an Iftar dinner at Gracie Mansion, which led to new round of attacks. Some of these come from predictable places, like the New York Post, but Jake Tapper also ran a segment on CNN where Mamdani was criticized over meeting with you.
What do you make of this stuff? Does it impact you, do you zone it out? What does it say about the opposition to Palestinian human rights in the United States?
It’s very unfortunate that you have these mainstream organizations, whether it is a news organization or a civil rights organization attacking me for literally advocating for the rights of Palestinians and letting real antisemitism go unchallenged.
We’ve seen several instances of of antisemitism across the country, especially in the Republican Party, but these organizations are not caring about that because what they care about is protecting Israel. What I did was criticize Israel. They’re trying their best to conflate anti-Zionism with antisemitism. Israel has been depending on, or exploiting, I would say, moral capital since World War II and that moral capital is eroding now.
So now it’s easier for them to silence those speaking out for Palestine, to silence anyone who’s daring to literally ask for human rights for Palestinians, human rights that every American enjoys..I think that’s what this moment is about. They don’t have any arguments, so they turn to smears..they don’t want to argue, they want to silence.
That explains the attacks over the Iftar with Mayor Mamdani and his wife, but even in the larger picture, Piers Morgan was called an antisemite! He’s a supporter of Israel, but just because he dared to criticize is is Israel, there’s smears. I think this a deliberate way to discredit us, to just mention all these smears so something will stick and people will forget that I was targeted for speaking out for Palestine, that I missed the birth of my child for nothing. This administration did not charge me with any crime.
So, it’s a smear intimidation campaign that’s designed to silence rather than to actually hold someone accountable.
I should point out, you referenced civil rights organization at the beginning of that answer. I assume you’re referencing the Anti-Defamation League [ADL], who condemned Mamdani for hosting you.
Yes. I usually call them anti-Palestinian Zionist hate groups, and that’s what they are.
Many of these groups have repeated a talking point about you wanting to “eradicate Western civilization.” This is cited as a justification for deporting you.
I’ve never said those words. This is a deliberate misattribution and fabrication built from a deleted social media post made by CUAD [CU Apartheid Divest].
It’s attributed to me personally to make my deportation seem less alarming than it is. The government has had over a year to produce evidence of wrongdoing. They have produced nothing because there is nothing.
The other part of it is, I’m not a Westerner. I’m a Palestinian-Syrian-Algerian. I’m an Arab born in a refugee camp and I came here as a student. So, they can’t even get their smear right.
CUAD was a group of over one hundred student groups, it was made up of thousands of students. It was created in 2016. The groups range from dancing clubs to cultural organizations to political groups with a large range of views. My role was a negotiator between the group and Columbia’s administration. I was not a spokesperson for the group, I was simply the person trusted by students, faculty, and administration to sit across the table and talk.
So, to take a deleted social media post from the corner of that enormous coalition and say I said it is simply a smear and had nothing to do with reality.
You recently wrote a op-ed for The Guardian, which was actually an open letter to Leqaa Kordia, the last remaining Columbia protester in detention. She was arrested on March 13, 2025. Can you talk about what compelled you to write that piece, and how your two cases are linked?
Leqaa’s case particular really, really remains with me. The fact that someone is spending a year in detention for doing nothing. Even if it’s an immigration thing, immigration detention is supposed to be civil detention, not punitive. If someone committed a big crime, they can get a bond and and get out in a criminal system.
I’m very well aware of the conditions..in these detention centers. [They] are not designed to have anyone to be long term, they’re supposed to be revolving doors. You go and within a month you’re either deported or getting your bond and you go out. So to spend a whole year in such environment is just a death sentence.
I wasn’t surprised when Leqaa was hospitalized a few weeks ago because yes, if I were in in detention for all that time, of course I would be hospitalized. It’s the same story as as mine. She’s only in detention for all this time because she’s Palestinian. Were she not Palestinian, she would have gotten her bond a long time ago and could fix her papers from the outside, as happens with everyone else. She got bond twice, not once, twice. Yet the government, again because the immigration process is fully controlled by the Trump administration, were able to to keep her in detention despite the bond.
So really this is what connects both of us, the Palestine exception in this country. Were she not Palestinian, she would be out long a long time ago. I wanted to remind people that there is still someone detained for their [pro-Palestine] views, not for committing any crimes and just to shed more light on the collective punishment from this administration.
