The student of Columbia driven out of ice causes to prevent deportation

A 21 -year -old Columbia University student who lived in the United States since she was a girl to court President Trump and other high -ranking administration officials on Monday after immigration officials tried to arrest and deport it.

The student, Yunseo Chung, is a permanent legal and junior resident who participated in pro-Palestinian demonstrations in the school. The Trump administration is arguing that its presence in the United States hinders the administration’s foreign policy agenda to stop the spread of anti -Semitism.

Administration officials, including the secretary of state, Marco Rubio, mentioned the same logic to explain the arrest this month of Mahmoud KhalilGraduated from the University and Permanent Resident which is held in Louisiana.

Unlike Mr. Khalil, Mrs. Chung does not seem to have been a prominent figure in the demonstrations that shook the school last year. But it was one of the many students arrested this year in relation to a protest at Barnard College.

Mrs. Chung, a high school Valentadictorian who moved to the United States with her family from South Korea when she was 7 years old, was not held by the ice. He remains in the country, but his lawyers would not have commented where he was.

His cause at the Federal Court of Manhattan shows the extended efforts, even if so far without success, of the officials of US immigration to arrest it. Agents historically prefer to collect immigrants in prison or prisons. Other types of arrests are more difficult, often require hours of research, surveillance and other investigative resources.

But the federal agents believed that these efforts were deserved in the case of Mrs. Chung, according to her lawyers of Clear, a legal clinic at City University in New York.

Immigration and customs officials visited several residences, have asked for help from the federal ministries and searched the university homes of Mrs. Chung on March 13th.

The involvement of federal ministries was particularly remarkable. According to the cause of Mrs. Chung, the agents apparently seek him for research on two residences on the Columbia campus with Warrant who quoted a criminal law known as a host statute, aimed at those who repay the non -citizens present in the United States illegally.

This reported that the research was linked to a wider criminal investigation by the Federal Ministries at Columbia University. Todd Blanche, deputy prosecutor general, he said That the school is under investigation “to host and hide illegal aliens in its campus”.

By operating under the aegis of a federal investigation it could report a new tactic. Ice agents and agents are often unable to arrest their goals because they do not respond to the door and an administrative mandate does not provide agents with access to a house.

The Trump administration has given priority to the possession of pro-Palestinian demonstrators, in particular those who are not legal residents. They looked for the arrest of Moistous language, A doctoral student in Africa Studies at Cornell University e Ranjani SrinivasanAnother student from Columbia University who left the country for Canada after learning that his visa by student had been revoked.

But the attempt to arrest Mrs. Chung, like the detention of Mr. Khalil, seems to be part of a new front in the repression of the immigration of the Trump administration – targeting immigrants who are more distant in their paths towards citizenship.

In their case, Mrs. Chung’s lawyers asked a judge to prevent the government from taking application actions against Mrs. Chung or from holding her, transferring her to another position or removing it from the United States. They also asked the judge to prevent the government from targeting any non-citizen for the deportation based on constitutionally protected discourse and on the pro-Palestinian defense.

One of Mrs. Chung’s lawyers, Naz Ahmad, said that “administration’s efforts to punish and suppress the speech do not agree with Smack of McCarthyism”.

“Like many thousands of students nationally, Yunseo raised his voice against what is happening in Gaza and supporting the other students who face an unjust discipline,” said Mrs. Ahmad, Clear’s co-director. “It cannot be the case that a straight student who lived here most of his life can be taken away and potentially deported, everything so that he dares to speak.”

A The representative of the Senior press for the Department of National Securization declared in a declaration that Mrs. Chung had “engaged in a conduct regarding the conduct, even when it was arrested by the NYPD during a pro-Hamas protest at the Barnard College. It is sought for removal procedures pursuant to immigration laws”.

The declaration added that Mrs. Chung would have the opportunity to present her case before an immigration judge and said that the ICE “would investigate the people engaged in activities in support of Hamas, a foreign terrorist organization”.

The representatives of the press for the Secretary of State and the Department of Justice did not respond to the requests for comment.

Mrs. Chung, who greater in English and gender studies, has participated in pro-Palestinian demonstrations since last year. His lawyers say they have not talked to journalists, negotiate on behalf of students’ protesters or in no other way to take a leadership position.

It was, however, accused by the University of joining other students in the publication of flyers depicting the members of the Foundation Council with the phrase “sought after complicity in the genocide”. According to the cause, the school did not discover that Mrs. Chung had violated any of her “applicable policies”.

The dizzying sequence of events that seems to have pushed Ice agents to present himself at his home seems to have started this month.

On March 5, Mrs. Chung protested outside a Barnard College building where the protesters of pro-Palestinian students had a sit-in. It was arrested by police officers, given a ticket for the desk on the charge of crime of obstruction of the government administration and released.

Four days later – E The day after the arrest of Mr. Khalil – Immigration officials appeared at the home of Mrs. Chung’s parents.

At that time, according to the cause, someone identifies himself as “Audrey with the police” sent a message to Mrs. Chung. When a lawyer for Mrs. Chung called the number, the woman said she was an agent with Ice, that the state department was free to revoke the status of residence of Mrs. Chung and that there was an administrative mandate for her arrest.

At the same time, the Public Security Office of Columbia University sent an EE -mail to Mrs. Chung to inform her that the federal prosecutor’s office in Manhattan had been in contact, repeating that ice officials were looking for the arrest of Mrs. Chung.

On March 10, Perry Carbone, a high -ranking lawyer at the Federal Prosecutor’s Office, told Mrs. Ahmad, the lawyer of Mrs. Chung, that the secretary of state, Mr. Rubio, had revoked the visa of Mrs. Chung. Mrs. Ahmad replied that Mrs. Chung was not in the country on a visa and was permanent resident. According to the cause, Mr. Carbone replied that Rubio also “revoked” him.

The conversation echoed to an exchange between Khalil’s lawyers and immigration agents who arrested him and who initially did not seem to be aware of his status as residence.

After his arrest, Mr. Khalil was quickly transferred, first in New Jersey and in the end in Louisiana, where he has been arrested since then. The statute that the Trump administration has used to justify its detention and potential deportation of Mrs. Chung states that the secretary of state can move against non -citizens whose presence has reasonable reasons to believe that they threaten the country’s foreign policy agenda. Since then, national security officials have added Other accusations against Mr. Khalil.

Rubio’s reminder addressed to Mr. Khalil also included the name of Mrs. Chung, according to a person with knowledge of her content.

In the cause of Mrs. Chung, her lawyers accused the government of obtaining Warrant “under false claims”, suggesting that the research under the host statute was simply a pretext for an attempt to retain Mrs. Chung and another student that the cause has not appointed. A spokesman for the American prosecutor’s office in Manhattan refused to comment on the statements that involve the office and Mr. Carbone.