A US immigration court has terminated the Trump administration’s attempt to deport a Tufts University student and pro-Palestinian activist who has been critical of Israel, NBC News reported, citing her lawyers on Monday.
The court ended the government’s removal proceedings on January 29, finding that the government failed to meet its burden of proving that Rümeysa Öztürk, a Ph.D. student from Turkey, should be deported, according to her legal team. Öztürk is studying children’s relationship to social media at Tufts.
The termination was disclosed Monday in a filing submitted on Öztürk’s behalf to the 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals in New York City, where she is challenging her arrest and detention.
“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,” Öztürk said in a statement Monday.
Though the pain that I and thousands of other women wrongfully imprisoned by ICE have faced cannot be undone, it is heartening to know that some justice can prevail after all.”
Immigration officers detained Öztürk in March, and a federal judge ordered her release in May while her habeas corpus petition proceeded on the merits. Terminating the removal proceedings “does not moot her habeas case,” her lawyers wrote.
In their filing Öztürk’s legal team said the immigration court rejected a key argument used by the Trump administration to revoke the immigration status of multiple students and campus activists critical of Israel’s war on Gaza.
Öztürk’s student visa was revoked by the US State Department after she co-authored an article in The Tufts Daily university newspaper criticizing the college’s handling of student anger around Israel’s war in Gaza.
Video of her arrest on March 25, 2025, outside her Somerville residence by masked agents sparked outrage online and added to concerns about freedom of speech and respect for due process under Trump. She was released from detention in May 2025.
In December a US federal judge allowed Öztürk to resume research and teaching while she deals with the consequences of having her visa revoked by the Trump administration, as she had been unable to teach or engage in research because her record was removed from the federal database that tracks foreign students studying in the United States.
A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security described the immigration court’s decision as “judicial activism” and labeled Öztürk a “terrorist sympathizer.”
“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 spokesperson said in a statement Monday. “And when you advocate for violence, glorify and support terrorists that relish the killing of Americans and harass Jews, that privilege should be revoked and you should not be in this country.”
Immigration court proceedings are generally not public, and the decision ruling that Öztürk cannot be deported was filed under seal, her lawyers said. They offered to provide a copy of the ruling to the appeals court under seal.
The Trump administration cited a rarely used provision of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 that allows the secretary of state to deport noncitizens if their presence is deemed to pose “potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States.”
In Monday’s filing Öztürk’s lawyers, including attorneys from the ACLU of Massachusetts, warned of what they described as the “dangers” of the government’s interpretation of the law.
“Under the government’s view,” they wrote, “it could punitively detain any noncitizen in retaliation for her speech for many months, so long as it simultaneously institutes removal proceedings—no matter how unmeritorious—all without any federal court review of the lawfulness of detention at any time.”
Defense team member Mahsa Khanbabai said in a statement Monday that the Trump administration “has manipulated immigration laws to silence people who advocate for Palestinian human rights and the ongoing humanitarian crisis in Gaza.”
“I hope that other immigration judges will follow her lead and decline to rubber stamp the president’s cruel deportation agenda,” Khanbabai added.
The then-30-year-old was one of four students who wrote the opinion piece in the campus newspaper. It criticized the university’s response to student activists demanding that Tufts “acknowledge the Palestinian genocide,” disclose its investments and divest from companies with ties to Israel.
Tufts University at the time publicly backed Öztürk, demanding her release so she could return to the school and complete her doctoral studies in child development.
Trump has targeted prestigious universities that became the epicenter of the US student protest movement sparked by Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza, stripping federal funds and directing immigration officers to deport foreign student demonstrators.
Critics argue that the campaign amounts to retribution and will have a chilling effect on free speech, while its supporters insist it is necessary to restore order to campuses and protect Jewish students.