“Alawieh, who graduated from medical school in Lebanon, first came to the United States in 2018 to start a fellowship at Ohio State University. She later began working as a kidney transplant specialist and professor at Brown University’s medical school and obtained an H-1B visa.
According to CNN, Alawieh’s immigration issues first began last month, when she traveled to Lebanon, and her visa to renter the United States was delayed due to increased security vetting of Lebanese travelers. The DHS posted on X that Alawieh had attended the funeral of Hassan Nasrallah, the former leader of Hezbollah who was assassinated by Israeli forces last year. “Alawieh openly admitted to this to CBP officers, as well as her support of Nasrallah,” the post reads.
It’s unclear why Alawieh was stopped by border officials when she arrived in Boston last Friday. A court filing obtained by Boston local news station WCVB states that Alawieh was found with photos of Nasrallah on her phone—though, again, it’s not clear why her phone was being searched in the first place.
“In explaining why these multiple photos were deleted by her one to two days before she arrived at Logan Airport, Dr. Alawieh stated that she did not want to give authorities the perception that she supports Hezbollah and the Ayatollah politically or militarily,” the filing read.
According to the document, Alawieh explained “I think if you listen to one of his sermons, you would know what I mean. He is a religious, spiritual person. As I said, he has very high value. His teachings are about spirituality and morality.””
…
“”This administration is not going tolerate individuals having the privilege of studying in our country and then siding with pro-terrorist organizations that have killed Americans,” Leavitt said last week. “We have a zero-tolerance policy for siding with terrorists, period.””
“Does it matter that Khalil is not a U.S. citizen? In the 1945 case Bridges v. Wixon, the Supreme Court held that “freedom of speech and of press is accorded aliens residing in this country.” That case involved a longtime legal resident from Australia who was deemed deportable based on the allegation that he had been affiliated with the Communist Party.
“Once an alien lawfully enters and resides in this country, he becomes invested with the rights guaranteed by the Constitution to all people within our borders,” Justice Frank Murphy wrote in a concurring opinion. “Such rights include those protected by the First and the Fifth Amendments and by the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. None of these provisions acknowledges any distinction between citizens and resident aliens.””
“the First Amendment is understood as a general restriction on the government’s behavior, as The Volokh Conspiracy’s Ilya Somin points out.
“The First Amendment’s protection for freedom of speech, like most constitutional rights, is not limited to US citizens,” he writes. “The text of the First Amendment is worded as a general limitation on government power, not a form of special protection for a particular group of people, such as US citizens or permanent residents.”
Setting aside the constitutional issue, the detention of a student activist for engaging in what would clearly be considered First Amendment–protected activity under other circumstances is very alarming. If the State Department wishes to proceed with this course of action, the burden is on the government to sufficiently explain why Khalil should be deported. Authorities must persuasively demonstrate that his conduct crosses some very, very red line.
Yet, at present, the government’s justifications don’t come anywhere close to satisfying such a requirement. On the contrary, the official explanation for Khalil’s detention is so woefully insufficient as to be laughable—except, of course, this matter isn’t funny at all.”
“The administration maintains that it has the power to revoke Khalil’s green card and deport him because he helped lead pro-Palestinian protests. Indeed, it’s becoming clear that Khalil was targeted because of his speech, rather than any other conduct that might be reasonably construed as criminal behavior.”
“A Rhode Island doctor who is an assistant professor at Brown University’s medical school has been deported to Lebanon even though a judge had issued an order blocking the U.S. visa holder’s immediate removal from the country, according to court papers.
The expulsion of Dr. Rasha Alawieh, 34, is set to be the focus of a hearing on Monday before a federal judge in Boston, who on Sunday demanded information on whether U.S. Customs and Border Protection had “willfully” disobeyed his order.”
“Less than 1% of immigrants deported last fiscal year were kicked out of the U.S. for crimes other than immigration violations.”
…
“To deport millions of “criminals,” Trump would have to consider all undocumented immigrants as criminals. But being in the U.S. illegally is a civil violation, not a criminal one.”
…
“Those millions would have to include agricultural, construction and service workers, students and others who are unauthorized to be in the U.S. but have no criminal backgrounds, according to legal specialists and an Axios review of federal immigration data.”
…
“”There are not millions of people with criminal records to deport,” Nicole Hallett, director of the Immigrants’ Rights Clinic at the University of Chicago, tells Axios.”
“In September, Lizzie Dearden and Thomas Gibbons-Neff wrote for The New York Times about the worldwide proliferation of designs for the FGC-9, a partially 3D-printed weapon that can “be built entirely from scratch, without commercial gun parts, which are often regulated and tracked by law enforcement agencies internationally.”
As one expert told the reporters: “Now you have something that people can make at home with unregulated components. So from a law enforcement perspective, how do you stop that?””
…
“Another mass-deportation program—known by the offensive title of “Operation Wetback,” referencing a slur about Mexicans who got wet illegally crossing the Rio Grande—took place during the Eisenhower administration. That operation, which was backed by Mexican authorities who faced a labor shortage per the same report, didn’t directly use the military. But the Border Patrol used military techniques—and it ensnared many U.S. citizens.
I doubt politicians who have engaged in rhetorical attacks on immigrants will worry about their hardships, but shouldn’t they be concerned about what it will mean for U.S. citizens? During the 1950s operation, “Border agents raided Mexican American neighborhoods, demanded ID from ‘Mexican-looking’ citizens in public, invaded private homes in the middle of the night and harassed Mexican-owned businesses,” according to Axios.
Our Constitution upholds due process. The government cannot simply grab people off the street. It needs to follow a legal process. Every accused person gets their day in court to make their case. As George Washington famously said, “Government is not reason, it is not eloquence—it is force.”
Unleashing such force on a broad scale will not result in precise, humane, and just results. Government agents will conduct raids. Illegal residents often live among legal ones. Wide swaths of the population will get caught up in the dragnets.”
…
“As someone who has hired construction workers in towns without large immigrant labor pools, I’m skeptical that large numbers of native-born Americans will jump at these newfound opportunities. The incoming administration embraces the Lump of Labor Fallacy—the idea that jobs are a zero-sum game where one person’s job comes at the expense of another’s job. In reality, more labor spurs economic growth and business development. That’s how market economies work.”
“Kevin Yang, a 46-year-old undocumented immigrant from China, said he once felt a sense of indebtedness toward the United States. But now, with President-elect Donald Trump’s second term on the horizon, he feels worried and on edge.
“The gratitude I once felt toward the U.S for accepting me into the country … has now shifted to anxiety and fear, Yang said. “And I know others in my situation feel the same.”
With the incoming Trump administration looking to prioritize deporting Chinese nationals, citing national security concerns, many undocumented Chinese men say they couldn’t feel further afield from the reasoning behind the potential policy — that Trump thinks they’re assembling an army within the United States.”
…
“having fled their homeland because of political persecution, or uprooted their lives for better economic opportunities, many undocumented Chinese men reject the notion of being a threat to the United States as absurd.”
…
“While Asian immigrants have long been the fastest-growing undocumented population, the number of Chinese nationals crossing into the United States in particular has skyrocketed in recent years. Between fiscal years 2022 and 2024, the number of undocumented Chinese nationals crossing both the northern and southern borders has tripled, from just over 27,000 to more than 78,000.
Experts and undocumented immigrants have said that China’s economic downturn and political friction, which came to a head during the country’s prolonged Covid-19 lockdowns and restrictions, were largely the basis of the migration wave. But Trump has repeatedly suggested that “military-age” men are conspiring to build an army.”
“During Trump’s first term, sanctuary cities refused to allow local law enforcement to share information with federal immigration agents or hand over immigrants in their custody. This time around, many are planning to do the same, even if doing so draws them into a fight with the second Trump administration.
Trump’s so-called border czar Tom Homan, a fellow at the conservative Heritage Foundation and a named contributor to its Project 2025 manifesto, has indicated the incoming administration plans to make sanctuary jurisdictions targets for “mass deportations.” Homan said recently he hopes that local law enforcement will cooperate with requests from US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to hand over undocumented immigrants already in their custody, especially when they pose a public safety threat.
“What mayor or governor doesn’t want public safety threats out of their communities?” he told the Center Square. “Their No. 1 responsibility is to protect their communities. That’s exactly what we are going to do.”
Most Democratic leaders, however, have made it clear that they will not accept federal government overreach on deportations and that they are preparing to challenge Trump’s immigration policies in court.
“We’re not looking for a fight from the Trump administration, but if he attacks our progress, we’ll fight back,” California Attorney General Rob Bonta told Vox. “Immigrants are such a critical part of who we are … who we will be.””
…
“In his first term, Trump’s crackdown on sanctuary jurisdictions took two forms: attempting to withhold federal funding from them and challenging their policies in court.”