Georgetown researcher Badar Khan Suri ordered released from ICE custody
A Georgetown University postdoctoral scholar has been ordered released from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody in the most recent loss for the Trump administration its its crackdown on international students and faculty.
Federal Judge Patricia Tolliver Giles ordered for Badar Khan Suri, an Indian national, to be released on bond on Wednesday, almost two months after ICE arrested him on March 17.
“The Constitution protects us all — regardless of citizenship — from being targeted by the government for our political speech and our family associations. The Trump administration is trying to silence speech it doesn’t agree with by targeting people like Dr. Khan Suri and Mahmoud Khalil, but ideas are not illegal,” said Eden Heilman, legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Virginia. “Dr. Khan Suri’s arrest and detention far away from his family is part of an extreme and unprecedented attack by this administration designed to punish students and academics for their views, and we won’t stop fighting until Dr. Khan Suri gets justice.”
Khan Suri was arrested in Arlington, Va., before he was transferred to Texas to be held in ICE detention. He will be allowed to return to Virginia with his wife, a Palestinian American, and three kids while his case against the constitutionality of his arrest continues.
The Trump administration argues he is a threat to the country’s foreign policy due to alleged ties to Hamas, although it has not provided additional details for those allegations.
“Suri has close connections to a known or suspected terrorist, who is a senior advisor to Hamas. The Secretary of State issued a determination on March 15, 2025 that Suri’s activities and presence in the United States rendered him deportable under INA section 237(a)(4)(C)(i),” Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said after his arrest.
His next hearing regarding the federal government’s attempt to deport him will occur in Texas on June 3.
“Hearing the judge’s words brought tears to my eyes,” said Mapheze Saleh, Khan Suri’s wife, in a release provided by his legal team. “I truly wish I could give her a heartfelt hug from me and from my three children, who long every day to see their father again. Speaking out about what’s happening in Palestine is not a crime. Let’s show the world that this country is still a place where people can and do express their beliefs without fear.”
Giles's order is the latest in a string of court losses for the Trump administration as it seeks to detain and deport many of the campus demonstrators from last year's pro-Palestinian protests.
Columbia University student Mohsen Mahdawi on April 30 became the first such activist to be released after he was arrested during his naturalization interview. Tufts University student Rümeysa Öztürk, who was taken off the street by plain clothes officers after writing an op-ed in support of Palestine, was ordered released on Friday.
But like Khan Suri's, their cases have not be dismissed, and the government has vowed to pursue them.
Mahmoud Khalil, the first target of the Trump administration’s student crackdown and former lead negotiator in the Columbia University protests, is still in ICE detention.
—Updated at 1:41 p.m. EDT