BOSTON (AP) — A Turkish student detained by federal officers as she walked along a street in a Boston suburb is the latest supporter of Palestinian causes to be swept up in the Trump administration’s crackdown on immigrants who express their political views.
Rumeysa Ozturk, 30, a doctoral student at Tufts University, was swiftly moved out of Massachusetts, another case of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement sending immigrants taken into custody to detention centers or deporting them altogether before a federal judge has a chance to weigh in and possibly halt the actions.
Ozturk, who was detained Tuesday shortly after she left her home in Somerville, had been moved to an ICE detention center in Louisiana by the time her lawyer went to court and a judge ordered her to be kept in Massachusetts, U.S. government lawyers said in a court document Thursday. They said they made her lawyers aware that she was being moved and facilitated contact with her Wednesday night.
A senior Department of Homeland Security spokesperson said federal authorities detained Ozturk after an investigation found she had “engaged in activities in support of Hamas, a foreign terrorist organization that relishes the killing of Americans.” The department did not provide evidence of that support.