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Politics
Erin Corcoran, Professor of immigration, refguee and asylum law, University of Notre Dame

Lawful permanent residents like Mahmoud Khalil have a right to freedom of speech – but does that protect them from deportation?

The detention of noncitizen university students after their Palestinian rights activism raises questions about the limits of free speech. Rob Dobi/Moment/Getty Images

The Trump administration has revoked the visas of more than 1,000 foreign university students since January 2025. Many of the individual cases that have made headlines center on foreign-born university students who participated in Palestinian rights protests.

In early March, the federal government arrested, detained and began deportation proceedings against Mahmoud Khalil, a lawful permanent resident born in Syria to Palestinian parents. Khalil participated in Palestinian rights protests at Columbia University in 2024.

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