June 20 (UPI) -- Former Columbia University graduate student Mahmoud Khalil on Friday night was freed from federal detention in central Louisiana on bail after a federal judge ordered his release.
In Newark, N.J., U.S. District Judge Michael Farbiarz said that prosecutors didn't provide a legitimate justification for 104 days of detention since March 8 by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The Syrian national organized campus protests in 2024 favoring Hamas while enrolled at Columbia University in New York City, which runs counter to U.S. foreign policy.
Farbiarz, who was appointed by President Joe Biden, said it was "highly, highly unusual" the government still wanted him detained.
"Together, they suggest that there is at least something to the underlying claim that there is an effort to use the immigration charge here to punish the petitioner -- and, of course, that would be unconstitutional," the judge said.
He was ordered to surrender his passport and travel documents, and restricted to New York, New Jersey, Michigan, Louisiana and Washington, D.C.
The Department of Justice will appeal to the circuit court or ultimately the Supreme Court.
"The Trump Administration acted well within its statutory and constitutional authority to detain Khalil, as it does with any alien who advocates for violence, glorifies and supports terrorists, harasses Jews, and damages property," Homeland Security posted on X before his release. "An immigration judge has already vindicated this position. We expect a higher court to do the same."
An immigration judge in Jena, Louisiana, earlier Friday denied Khalil's request for asylum and ordered him to remain detained. But Farbiarz's order supersedes that.
While in detention, Khalil missed the birth of his first child in New York in April, and he was allowed to hold him while in custody in May. His wife is a U.S. citizen.
Khalil walked out of the detention center in Jena, La., about 220 miles northwest of New Orleans, with his lawyers and wearing a kaffiyeh, a symbol of Palestinian solidarity.
He said no person "should actually be detained for protesting a genocide," Khalil said. "Justice will prevail."
"After more than three months we can finally breathe a sigh of relief and know that Mahmoud is on his way home to me and Deen, who never should have been separated from his father," Dr. Noor Abdalla, Mahmoud Khalil's wife, said in a statement released by the American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey. "We know this ruling does not begin to address the injustices the Trump administration has brought upon our family, and so many others the government is trying to silence for speaking out against Israel's ongoing genocide against Palestinians. But today we are celebrating Mahmoud coming back to New York to be reunited with our little family, and the community that has supported us since the day he was unjustly taken for speaking out for Palestinian freedom."
Alina Das, one of Khalil's lawyers and co-director of New York University's Immigrant Rights Clinic, said: "The purpose of every step that the government has taken in this case has been to ensure that Mr. Khalil remains locked away until he is deported, as retaliation and punishment for his speech."
After the birth of his son Deen, he wrote: "During your first moments, I buried my face in my arms and kept my voice low so that the 70 other men sleeping in this concrete room would not see my cloudy eyes or hear my voice catch. I feel suffocated by my rage and the cruelty of a system that deprived your mother and me of sharing this experience. Why do faceless politicians have the power to strip human beings of their divine moments?
"Since that morning, I have come to recognize the look in the eyes of every father in this detention center. I sit here contemplating the immensity of your birth and wonder how many more firsts will be sacrificed to the whims of the US government, which denied me even the chance of furlough to attend your birth."
He was arrested outside student housing on the campus.
On June 11, Farbiarz ordered Khalil's release after determining that the government could no longer detain him over the claim he is a threat to the country's foreign policy.
Then two days later, Trump administration said Khalil could be detained because they said he kept some prior work off his application for permanent residency. The judge allowed the detention to continue.
The Justice Department wanted him detained until an immigration judge could weigh the matter, claiming tFarbiarz does not have jurisdiction.
Farbiarz said it would be a "waste of time" to send the case to an immigration judge who would likely reach his same conclusion.
Other pro-Palestinian activists have also been released as their immigration cases go through the courts.
In April, Secretary of State Marco Rubio released a memo, citing an obscure provision of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952. The secretary of state can deport noncitizens if the secretary determines their presence in the country would result in "potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States."
The arrest was carried out by the ICE, which is part of Homeland Security.
Khalil, who was born in 1995, grew up in a Palestinian refugee camp in Syria and was granted permanent U.S. resident status. H
