BOSTON, Massachusetts: A Turkish graduate student from Tufts University, whose immigration officials detained near her Massachusetts home, had her deportation blocked by an immigration court.
The immigration court found on January 29 that the Department of Homeland Security could not prove that Rümeysa Öztürk should be removed from the U.S., her attorneys said.
The attorneys stated in a letter to the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which has been reviewing her case, that the immigration court also terminated Öztürk's removal proceedings.
Her attorneys said the department has the option to appeal the immigration court's decision.
Öztürk is a PhD student who studies how children use social media. She was arrested last March while walking on a street, at a time when the Trump administration was focusing on foreign-born students and activists who supported pro-Palestinian causes. She had helped write an opinion article criticizing her university's response to Israel and the war in Gaza.
A video showed masked agents putting handcuffs on her and taking her away in an unmarked vehicle.
A petition seeking her release was first filed in federal court in Boston and later moved to Burlington, Vermont. She was released from an immigration detention center in Louisiana in May and returned to the Tufts University campus near Boston.
A federal judge said her case raised serious questions about her free speech rights, her right to fair legal process, and her health. The federal government appealed the decision to release her to the 2nd Circuit Court.
Her lawyers told the court that the government might try to detain her again if it challenges the immigration court's decision before the Board of Immigration Appeals.
The Department of Homeland Security said in a statement that visas for foreign students to live, study, and work in the United States are a privilege, not a right, regardless of court rulings. The agency did not clearly say what it plans to do in Öztürk's case.
Öztürk said she felt encouraged that justice can still prevail.
"Today, I breathe a sigh of relief knowing that despite the justice system's flaws, my case may give hope to those who have also been wronged by the U.S. government," she said in a statement released by her attorneys.
