An immigration court stopped the government from deporting Tufts University PhD student Rümeysa Öztürk, her attorneys said, setting up further review as the case moves through the federal appeals system. In court filings, Öztürk’s lawyers said the immigration court found that the Department of Homeland Security had not met its burden to remove her and terminated her removal proceedings.
Öztürk’s attorneys said the immigration court made that determination on Jan. 29, according to documents filed Monday with the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The filings also described the proceedings as having been terminated by the immigration court, with the case now before the appellate court.
The case involves Öztürk, a Turkish national studying children’s relationship to social media. Her attorneys said she was detained by immigration officials near her Massachusetts home and that the episode began last March while she was a foreign student in the U.S.
Her lawyers said she was arrested as the Trump administration began targeting foreign-born students and activists involved in pro-Palestinian advocacy. Öztürk has been associated with public criticism of her university’s response to Israel and the war in Gaza, including through an op-ed she co-authored, her attorneys said.
Öztürk’s attorneys also said there was video showing masked agents handcuffing her and placing her into an unmarked vehicle. They said a petition to release her was filed first in federal court in Boston and then moved to Burlington, Vermont.
After a period of litigation in federal court, a federal judge said Öztürk raised “serious concerns” about her First Amendment and due process rights, as well as her health, according to the attorneys’ description in the Monday filing. Her attorneys said the federal government appealed her release and the case arrived at the 2nd Circuit.
Öztürk’s lawyers said in their filings to the 2nd Circuit that the government could try to detain her again if it appeals the immigration court’s decision to the Board of Immigration Appeals. They also said Öztürk has remained out of detention since May, describing that time as being spent at a Louisiana immigrant detention center before she returned to the Tufts campus outside Boston.
In a statement, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security said: “Visas provided to foreign students to live, study, and work, in the United States are a privilege, not a right — no matter what this or any other activist judicial ruling says.” The agency, the attorneys’ account says, did not directly address the government’s plans in Öztürk’s case.
Öztürk also issued a statement through her attorneys saying she felt relief after the immigration court’s ruling. “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.