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Huffington Post
HuffPost
14 Apr 2025


NextImg:State Department Memo Found No Evidence Tying Tufts Student To Antisemitism Or Terrorism: Report
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A Tufts University student snatched off the streets by immigration officers has no known connections to antisemitism or terrorist activity, a State Department memo reportedly showed days before her detention.

On March 25, Rumeysa Ozturk, a Turkish national working on her Ph.D., was detained on a Massachusetts street by masked Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers after her visa was abruptly revoked.

The 30-year-old was moved to an ICE detention center in Basile, Louisiana. Her lawyers say the detention violates her constitutional rights, including the right to free speech and due process.

Ozturk is one of several people with ties to American universities whose visas were rescinded or who have been stopped from entering the U.S. after they were accused of attending demonstrations or publicly expressing support for Palestinians.

Now, reporting by The Washington Post raises questions over the justification for Ozturk’s detainment.

It cites an internal State Department memo, which was described to the Post, that said there was insufficient evidence for Secretary of State Marco Rubio to order the revocation of Ozturk’s visa in a purported effort to safeguard U.S. foreign policy interests.

The Department of Homeland Security has claimed that investigations found that Ozturk engaged in activities in support of Hamas, a U.S.-designated terrorist group.

According to the Post, a memo DHS sent to the State Department before Ozturk’s detention described her “anti-Israel activism” as an opinion piece she wrote for The Tufts Daily last March with three others.

The piece called on the school’s president to engage with pro-Palestinian protesters and divest from companies with ties to Israel.

But the State Department subsequently found that beyond Ozturk protesting Tufts’ relationship with Israel, “neither DHS nor ICE nor Homeland Security investigations produced any evidence showing that Ozturk has engaged in antisemitic activity or made public statements indicating support for a terrorist organization,” the Post reported, citing U.S. government staff briefed on the memo.

The memo also stated officials searched various U.S. government databases, which reportedly failed to find that she had links to any terror groups.

As a result, the department said, Ozturk could potentially be deported under a separate section of the Immigration and Nationality Act that allows visas to be revoked at the secretary of state’s discretion.

The State Department told the Post “we do not comment on ongoing or pending litigation.”

The DHS declined the Post’s request for comment.

Rubio has repeatedly suggested Ozturk’s alleged infractions go beyond an op-ed, telling journalists, “The activities presented to me meet the standard of what I’ve just described to you: people that are supportive of movements that run counter to the foreign policy of the United States.”

A hearing on the legality of Ozturk’s detention in Louisiana takes place Monday in Burlington, Vermont.

Her attorneys are asking the federal judge to rule that the Vermont district court is the appropriate venue to hear the case, as it was the last place she was taken before being transferred to the processing center in Basile.

Ozturk has detailed how she has had multiple asthma attacks at the “unsanitary, unsafe, and inhumane” facility in Louisiana.

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U.S. Justice Department lawyers argue that Ozturk’s case in New England should be dismissed and that it should be handled in immigration court.

At the hearing, Ozturk’s lawyers argued she is being detained solely as a result of the op-ed and that her arrest was “an unlawful use of immigration law” designed to “send a clear message to all other non-citizens in this country that if you express opinions that the government disagrees with, you will be punished,” The Boston Globe reported.