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Welcome to The Logoff. Patrick Reis is off as we speak: Rümeysa Öztürk was detained by the Trump administration, seemingly only for writing an op-ed. Now, in a scorching new ruling, a federal decide ordered her freed.
What’s the background? Öztürk — a Tufts College PhD pupil and a Turkish nationwide — was whisked off the streets of Massachusetts by ICE brokers in late March. Her arrest was a part of the Trump administration effort to revoke visas from college students who protested Israel’s warfare in Gaza.
Her detention stood out as notably stunning as a result of there was no indication she had ever engaged in any disruptive or lawbreaking protests. She had merely co-authored an op-ed in Tufts’ pupil newspaper final 12 months that criticized the warfare and urged college directors to acknowledge college students’ considerations about it.
A Trump administration spokesperson anonymously claimed in March that “DHS and ICE investigations discovered Öztürk engaged in actions in assist of Hamas.” However to today they’ve conspicuously failed to provide any proof of that — together with, when Öztürk filed go well with, earlier than a decide.
What did the decide say? Decide William Periods III ordered Öztürk launched “instantly.” Ruling from the bench, he sounded appalled by the Trump administration’s conduct, which he mentioned “chills the speech of the tens of millions and tens of millions of people who find themselves not residents.”
He mentioned Öztürk had made “very substantial claims of First Modification and due course of violations,” and that, moreover, the federal government had supplied “no proof” about their motivation for detaining her aside from the op-ed.
Is that this case over, then? No. Öztürk was ordered launched from detention. However the query of whether or not the US authorities can legally revoke her visa stays unresolved. Whereas Periods sounds very more likely to rule in her favor, it’s unclear if conservatives on the Supreme Court docket will do the identical, ought to the case attain them. Nonetheless, this case has been a humiliation to the Trump administration, and maybe there’s a faint glimmer of hope they’ll resolve to simply drop it. Too optimistic? Most likely.
And with that, it’s time to log out…
If you’d like some good artwork movie suggestions, Jia Zhangke — among the finest administrators working as we speak, for my part — visited the Criterion Closet this week and picked a few of his favorites. His personal movies are additionally streaming on the Criterion Channel — if you happen to’re desirous about contemplative films in regards to the modernization of China that abruptly drop a Village Folks dance observe, examine them out!
