Federal Court: Trump Administration Violated First Amendment By Deporting Foreign Citizens for Pro-Palestinian Advocacy

Middle East Studies Association | –

NB: The MESA news release below has been expanded with extended quotes from the Knight First Amendment Institute and Judge William G. Young that were only given as hyperlinks in the original.

In Landmark Ruling, Federal Court Says Trump Administration Violated First Amendment By Deporting Foreign Citizens for Pro-Palestinian Advocacy

Court says noncitizens have “the same free speech rights as the rest of us”.

 

(Boston) – Judge William G. Young of the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts today ruled in the lawsuit filed by the Middle East Studies Association (MESA) and others that the Trump administration’s policy of arresting, detaining, and deporting noncitizen students and faculty members for their pro-Palestinian advocacy violates the First Amendment. The ruling comes after a two-week trial in the case brought by the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University, partnering with Sher Tremonte LLP, on behalf of the Middle East Studies Association and the American Association of University Professors (AAUP). It was the first major trial of President Trump’s second term.

Filed in March, the lawsuit alleged that the Trump administration’s “ideological deportation” policy violates the First Amendment and is unconstitutional. The nine-day trial in July that included the testimony of 15 witnesses forced the disclosure of a wealth of new details about the policy and its devastating effects on campuses nationwide. See a summary of the disclosures here.

In today’s ruling, Judge Young wrote, “This case—perhaps the most important ever to fall within the jurisdiction of this district court—squarely presents the issue whether non-citizens lawfully present here in  [the] United States actually have the same free speech rights as the rest of us. The Court answers this Constitutional question unequivocally ‘yes, they do.’ ‘No law’ means ‘no law.’ The First Amendment does not draw President Trump’s invidious distinction and it is not to be found in our history or jurisprudence.”

Middle East Studies Association President Aslı Bâli said, “We deeply appreciate the court’s principled ruling. The Trump Administration’s actions have grievously harmed our colleagues, by treating protected free speech and freedom of association as deportable offenses. Our ability to meet, as a scholarly association, and to discuss critical topics of our field, have been directly diminished by the chilling effect of the government’s ideological deportations. The attack on  the constitutionally protected rights of our members and conference attendees is unconscionable, and must be redressed.”

In addition to the AAUP and MESA, plaintiffs include AAUP chapters at Harvard, Rutgers, and NYU. The associations’ members include tens of thousands of faculty and students across the country.

Jameel Jaffer, executive director at the Knight First Amendment Institute, concurred, saying: “This is a historic ruling that should have immediate implications for the Trump administration’s policies. If the First Amendment means anything, it means the government can’t imprison people simply because it disagrees with their political views. We welcome the court’s reaffirmation of this basic idea, which is foundational to our democracy.” 

Todd Wolfson, president of the American Association of University Professors, observed, “The Trump administration’s attempt to deport students for their political views is an assault on the Constitution and a betrayal of American values. This trial exposed their true aim: to intimidate and silence anyone who dares oppose them. If we fail to fight back, Trump’s thought police won’t stop at pro-Palestinian voices—they will come for anyone who speaks out. Defending democracy means standing up now—loudly, visibly, and together.”

Read today’s decision here.

Read more about the case here. The Knight First Amendment Institute site explains:

“On March 25, 2025, the Knight Institute filed a lawsuit challenging the Trump administration’s policy of arresting, detaining, and deporting noncitizen students and faculty who participate in pro-Palestinian activism. The lawsuit, filed on behalf of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP), AAUP’s Harvard, NYU, and Rutgers campus chapters, and the Middle East Studies Association, argues that the policy chills noncitizens from speaking and, by extension, robs these organizations and their U.S. citizen members of noncitizens’ perspectives on a matter of significant public debate.

‘The lawsuit responds to a climate of repression and fear on university campuses. Federal agencies are attempting to deport multiple individuals for their pro-Palestinian advocacy, including Mahmoud Khalil, a leader of protests at Columbia University. These actions have sent chills through the community of noncitizen students and faculty on campuses around the country, causing some to pull out of academic conferences, stay home from protests, and withdraw from other forms of public advocacy and engagement.

“The lawsuit alleges that the administration’s policy of ideological deportation violates the First Amendment right of the plaintiffs to hear from and associate with noncitizen students and faculty, that it is unconstitutionally vague, and that it violates the Administrative Procedure Act. The suit seeks a court order declaring that the policy is unlawful and enjoining the federal government from enforcing it.”

William G. Young, Senior Judge of the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts, a Reagan appointee, wrote in part:

“Proposed by Congress in 1789, and ratified in 1791, the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States — its words carved in New Hampshire granite on the exterior of the very courthouse in which this Court sits — provides:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances . . .

“This case -– perhaps the most important ever to fall within the jurisdiction of this district court –- squarely presents the issue whether non-citizens lawfully present here in United States actually have the same free speech rights as the rest of us. The Court answers this Constitutional question unequivocally “yes, they do.” “No law” means “no law.” The First Amendment does not draw President Trump’s invidious distinction and it is not to be found in our history or [4] jurisprudence. See Section III.A infra. No one’s freedom of speech is unlimited, of course, but these limits are the same for both citizens and non-citizens alike . . .

“Having carefully considered the entirety of the record, this Court finds by clear and convincing evidence3 that the Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem and the Secretary of State Marco Rubio, together with the subordinate officials and agents of each of them, deliberately and with purposeful aforethought, did so concert their actions and those of their two departments intentionally to chill the rights to freedom of speech and peacefully to assemble of the non-citizen plaintiff members of the plaintiff associations . . .

“It was never the Secretaries’ immediate intention to deport all pro-Palestinian non-citizens for that obvious First Amendment violation, that could have raised a major outcry. Rather, the intent of the Secretaries was more invidious — to target a few for speaking out and then use the full rigor of the Immigration and Nationality Act (in ways it had never been used before) to have them publicly deported with the goal of tamping down pro- Palestinian student protests and terrorizing similarly situated non-citizen (and other) pro-Palestinians into silence because their views were unwelcome. The Secretaries have succeeded, apparently well beyond their immediate intentions . . .

“the President may not have authorized this operation (or even known about it), but once it was in play the President wholeheartedly supported it, making many individual case specific comments (some quite cruel) that demonstrate he has been fully briefed. Such conduct, of course, violates his sacred oath to “faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and . . . to the best of [his] Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States U.S. Const. art. II, § 1, cl. 8, by ignoring the Constitution’s command that the President “take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed,” U.S. Const. art. II, § 3. The fact that the President is, for all practical purposes, totally immune from any consequences for this conduct, Trump v. United States, 603 U.S. 593 (2024), does not relieve this Court of its duty to find the facts. Fed. R. Civ. P. 52(a) . . .”

“And there’s the issue of masks. This Court has listened carefully to the reasons given by Öztürk’s captors for masking- up and has heard the same reasons advanced by the defendant Todd Lyons, Acting Director of ICE. It rejects this testimony as disingenuous, squalid and dishonorable. ICE goes masked for a single reason — to terrorize Americans into quiescence.

“Small wonder ICE often seems to need our respected military to guard them as they go about implementing our immigration laws. It should be noted that our troops do not ordinarily wear masks. Can you imagine a masked marine? It is a matter of honor — and honor still matters. To us, masks are associated with cowardly desperados and the despised Ku Klux Klan. In all our history we have never tolerated an armed masked secret police.

“For these reasons, this Court rules that here the Plaintiffs have shown that Secretaries Noem and Rubio are engaged in a mode of enforcement leading to detaining, deporting, and revoking noncitizens’ visas solely on the basis of political speech, and with the intent of chilling such speech and that of others similarly situated. Such conduct is not only unconstitutional, but a thing virtually unknownto our constitutional tradition.” (/ End Judge Young’s remarks.)

Having found that the policy violates the First Amendment, the court will turn to the question of relief in the coming weeks.  

Lawyers on the case include Ramya Krishnan, Jameel Jaffer, Alex Abdo, Scott Wilkens, Carrie DeCell, Xiangnong (George) Wang, Talya Nevins, Jackson Busch, and Stephany Kim of the Knight First Amendment Institute; Ahilan Arulanantham; Michael Tremonte, Noam Biale, Alexandra Conlon, and Courtney Gans of Sher Tremonte; and Edwina Clarke and David Zimmer for Zimmer, Citron & Clarke.

For more information, contact: Adriana Lamirande, adriana.lamirande@knightcolumbia.org.