A federal decide in New Jersey on Tuesday denied the federal government’s movement to dismiss Palestinian Columbia graduate pupil Mahmoud Khalil’s habeas corpus case, rejecting an effort to get it moved to Louisiana.
In a 67-page determination, Choose Michael Farbiarz discovered that he had jurisdiction over the matter that the Trump administration has aggressively argued must be heard in Louisiana. Khalil’s attorneys maintained that the federal government needed the case moved there, in order that any challenges can be directed towards the Fifth Circuit Court docket of Appeals, thought-about among the many nation’s most conservative.
Khalil, a inexperienced card holder, was swept up by Homeland Safety brokers on March 8 after returning residence to his Columbia-owned residence from an Iftar dinner together with his spouse, who’s on the verge of giving delivery to their first baby. He performed a number one function in campus protests final yr towards Israeli bombing in Gaza and Columbia’s funding ties to Israel’s authorities, appearing as a mediator between pupil protesters and college directors.
Brokers took him downtown to 26 Federal Plaza and hours later to a personal detention facility in Elizabeth, N.J. They put him on a airplane heading down south the next day. He has since been held at a detention middle in Jena, La., the place he has stated he’s sleeping in chilly services and not using a blanket.
As an alternative of accusing Khalil of breaking U.S. legal guidelines, the Trump administration has cited an obscure provision in a 1952 regulation that empowers Secretary of State Marco Rubio to order somebody deported if their presence within the nation might pose unfavorable penalties for U.S. overseas coverage, which the feds declare his advocacy for Palestinians does. Khalil was the primary of a number of college students within the U.S. to be focused at breakneck velocity this month.
Shortly after his arrest, Khalil’s attorneys filed a habeas corpus petition, which challenges the legality of somebody’s detention, in Manhattan, the place the feds had instructed his spouse and attorneys he can be. A federal decide in Manhattan later transferred the case to New Jersey, his location on the time the petition was introduced.
The federal government sought to persuade the courts that New Jersey by no means had jurisdiction over the case and {that a} habeas corpus petition might solely be focused towards officers at a Louisiana detention facility, which Farbiarz rejected — discovering the regulation required the petition filed in New York on March 9 at 4:40 a.m. have to be handled as if it had been filed in New Jersey.
“Under habeas law, jurisdiction in a particular district is established when a petitioner is physically present in the district at the same moment a petition is filed there on his behalf,” Farbiarz wrote.
“That confluence happened here.”
Representatives for the Justice Division didn’t instantly reply to requests for remark.
In an announcement, Khalil’s spouse, Dr. Noor Abdalla, stated she was relieved by the ruling.
“As the countdown to our son’s birth begins and I inch closer and closer to my due date, I will continue to strongly advocate for Mahmoud’s freedom and for his safe return home, so he can be by my side to welcome our first child,” Abdalla stated.
A lawyer for Khalil, Baher Azmy, the authorized director of the Heart for Constitutional Rights, echoed Abdalla’s feedback.
“We are grateful the court wisely understood that the government cannot try to manipulate the jurisdiction of the United States courts in a transparent attempt to shield their unconstitutional – and, frankly, chilling – behavior,” Azmy stated.
“We look forward to the next phase of this case, which is to get Mahmoud out of detention and into the arms of his family, and then to prove the Trump administration’s attempted deportation of Mahmoud and others is nothing but unconstitutional retaliation for protected speech.”
Initially Printed: April 1, 2025 at 7:11 PM EDT
