‘First Arrest of Many’: Trump Promises More Arrests of Pro-Palestinian Protestors on College Campuses
AP Photo/Mary Altaffer
President Donald Trump boasted Monday about the arrest of a pro-Palestinian protestor, Mahmoud Khalil, whom he described as “a Radical Foreign Pro-Hamas Student on the campus of Columbia University.”
Khalil is a Palestinian and now a former grad student at Columbia who was taken into custody Saturday night after ICE agents reportedly entered his university-owned apartment.
His lawyer, Amy Greer, told the Associated Press she spoke by phone to one of the agents during the arrest. The agent informed her that they were acting on State Department orders to cancel his student visa. When she told them he was a permanent resident of the U.S., the agent said they were revoking his green card instead.
Department of Homeland Security spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin confirmed Khalil’s arrest in a statement to the AP on Sunday, saying it was orchestrated “in support of President Trump’s executive orders prohibiting anti-Semitism.”
The DHS’s official X account also posted that Khalil “led activities aligned to Hamas, a designated terrorist organization.”
Trump posted on social media:
Following my previously signed Executive Orders, ICE proudly apprehended and detained Mahmoud Khalil, a Radical Foreign Pro-Hamas Student on the campus of Columbia University. This is the first arrest of many to come. We know there are more students at Columbia and other Universities across the Country who have engaged in pro-terrorist, anti-Semitic, anti-American activity, and the Trump Administration will not tolerate it. Many are not students, they are paid agitators. We will find, apprehend, and deport these terrorist sympathizers from our country — never to return again. If you support terrorism, including the slaughtering of innocent men, women, and children, your presence is contrary to our national and foreign policy interests, and you are not welcome here. We expect every one of America’s Colleges and Universities to comply. Thank you!
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