Judge denies Justice Department's effort to move detained Tufts student's case to Louisiana
Source: CBS News
April 4, 2025 / 3:14 PM EDT
Washington — A federal judge on Friday rejected an effort by the Justice Department to throw out a Tufts University Ph.D. student's challenge to her detention after she was taken into custody by immigration authorities or have her case moved to Louisiana, finding instead that her case should be transferred to Vermont.
In addition to ruling that the case of Rumeysa Ozturk, a Turkish doctoral student, should be moved to a different court, U.S. District Judge Denies Casper blocked the government from removing Ozturk from the U.S. to ensure she has the opportunity to have her petition challenging her detention heard in Vermont. Casper, who sits on the district court in Massachusetts, was weighing a case involving Ozturk, who was taken into custody by Immigration and Customs Enforcement outside of her Somerville, Massachusetts, apartment on March 25 after her student visa was revoked.
While a letter dated March 25 did not state the basis for revocation of her visa, Ozturk had co-authored an editorial published in March 2024 in the school newspaper that criticized Tufts for dismissing several resolutions adopted by the undergraduate student Senate in an effort to "hold Israel accountable for clear violations of international law." She is one of several students at American universities who have had their visas revoked after expressing support for Palestinians during Israel's ongoing war with Hamas in Gaza.
Following Ozturk's arrest, immigration officials took her from Somerville to Methuen, Massachusetts, and then to Lebanon, New Hampshire, according to court filings. From there, she was brought to an ICE field office in St. Albans, Vermont, and was held there overnight. The following morning, on March 26, Ozturk was taken to the airport in Burlington, Vermont, and flown to Alexandria, Louisiana, where her custody was transferred to an immigration detention facility in Basile, Louisiana.
Read more: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/judge-detained-tufts-student-rumeysa-ozturk-case-vermont/
This is another example of the GOP trying to find ways to "judge shop" and move people out of other jurisdictions, to one that is under the RW loon 5th Circuit.