ICE Ambushed Mohsen Mahdawi In A 'Trap' And Had A 'Clear Plan To Ship Him To Louisiana'

The Palestinian Columbia student’s legal team says Mahdawi signed a pledge to defend the Constitution, and then ICE showed up.

By Prem Thakker, Zeteo

Mohsen Mahdawi attended his US citizenship interview, raised his right hand, and answered all the questions asked of him, before signing a document to pledge that he was willing to “defend the Constitution and laws of the United States of America against all enemies, foreign, and domestic.”

And then, shortly after, the immigration official he was working with walked out, saying he needed to “check” on something and he’d be right back. Masked and visibly armed ICE agents subsequently marched in and shackled Mahdawi, took him to a car, and immediately set out on “a clear plan to ship him to Louisiana,” over 1,000 miles away.

That’s according to Mahdawi’s legal team in a Tuesday legal filing making a motion for his release from detention. “It was a trap,” his team concludes.

Mahdawi, a green card holder, was detained by the Trump administration nearly two weeks ago. The Palestinian Columbia student had been active in pro-Palestine and pro-peace protests on campus during the last 18 months. After his arrest, a leaked memo revealed that the State Department was attempting to justify his arrest by fielding the spurious claim that he threatened the “Middle East peace process” due to his “threatening rhetoric and intimidation.”

Mahdawi’s lawyers call the allegations “baseless.” In a statement via his legal team on Wednesday, Mahdawi said: “I am in prison but am not prisoned. A system of democracy guarantees freedom of speech. Speaking of Palestine does not only qualify as freedom of speech but it is also about our humanity.”