A federal magistrate is recommending a Palestinian woman from New Jersey who was arrested during a Columbia University protest should be released from a North Texas immigration detention center while her case plays out in court.
In an opinion Friday, U.S. Magistrate Judge Rebecca Rutherford wrote Leqaa Kordia should immediately be released from Prairieland Detention Center in Alvarado, where she's been detained since March for allegedly overstaying her student visa. An immigration judge granted her a $20,000 bond in April, but an immediate appeal of that decision by the Department of Homeland Security to the Board of Immigration Appeals triggered an automatic stay in the case that has kept Kordia detained.
That poses a serious risk to Kordia's personal liberty, Rutherford ruled.
"Even if the BIA ultimately upholds the (immigration judge)'s decision to release Petitioner on bond, DHS will have deprived Petitioner of her liberty for a significant period of time without any individualized or particularized showing that her continued detention is justified," Rutherford wrote. "As Petitioner argues, 'the damage will already have been done.'"
The ruling comes three weeks after Rutherford heard arguments in the case from attorneys for the Texas Civil Rights Project, one of the legal advocacy groups representing Kordia, and DHS. Dozens of protestors demonstrated outside the Dallas federal courthouse that day in support of Kordia's release.
Rutherford's findings are not final. They serve as a recommendation to U.S. District Judge Sam Lindsay on how to rule in the case.
KERA News has reached out to TCRP, DHS and other attorneys for Kordia and will update this story with any response.
Kordia, a 32-year-old born in the West Bank and living in Paterson, New Jersey, came to the United States in 2016 on a tourist visa. New York police officers arrested her at a pro-Palestinian protest at Columbia University. Prosecutors ultimately dismissed the two charges against her.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrested Kordia in March after she presented herself for an interview about her expired student visa. Kordia studied English for seven years at Uceda Paterson and Bergen County Career Advancement Training under the Student and Exchange Visitor Program, according to court documents.
Kordia's court filings say she withdrew from the student visa program in 2022 at her teacher's "erroneous" advice, meaning she fell out of compliance with the terms of her visa. She was then flown to Prairieland, about 37 miles southwest of Dallas.
Kordia's attorneys allege she's being detained for her pro-Palestinian activism, and her detention violates her First and Fifth Amendment rights to speech and due process, respectively. They say Kordia has been unconstitutionally denied the ability to receive halal meals and pray according to her Muslim faith.
Kordia's attorneys also say the DHS's immediate appeal after she was granted bond unfairly keeps her at Prairieland.
DHS argues the department and the U.S. attorney general have the discretionary authority to decide whether to detain Kordia, and Rutherford lacks the judicial authority to review that decision.
An attorney for the agency said in court it's not unusual for officials under the Trump administration to investigate people without legal status who have previously flown under the radar, like Kordia, and there's no validity to the claims she's been targeted for her views. DHS requested the court deny Kordia's release because she can be released once the BIA decides her bond appeal or the appeal lapses on July 14, so her detention is "relatively modest and limited" and not unconstitutional.
But Rutherford wrote that Kordia's continued detention without justification threatens her liberty, and it doesn't burden federal officials to impose additional procedural requirements on their ability to keep Kordia in detention. Kordia's attorneys have proved she's likely to succeed on her claims when they're fully tried on the merits, Rutherford wrote, and she should thus get preliminary injunctive relief — that is, release.
Kordia is at least the second pro-Palestinian protester at Columbia facing attempted deportation proceedings under President Donald Trump's administration. Mahmoud Khalil, a Columbia student also arrested after his participation in the campus protests last spring, was released from an immigration detention center in Louisiana last week after a judge released him on bail.
It's part of a wider federal crackdown on pro-Palestinian protesters in the U.S. on student visas.
Kordia's next immigration hearing is July 24.
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