BOSTON—Below are highlights from today’s proceedings in the trial before Judge William G. Young in the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts in a case challenging the Trump administration’s policy of ideological deportation.

  • A senior ICE official testified in court today that the dossiers the agency compiled on Rümeysa Öztürk, Mahmoud Khalil, and others highlighted their pro-Palestinian speech and association. After Judge Young provided the dossiers to the plaintiffs this morning, they were admitted into evidence and shown in open court—the first time that anyone outside the government has seen these documents.

    • The official testified that Öztürk’s dossier included her student newspaper op-ed. The dossier also incorporated Öztürk’s page on the Canary Mission website.

    • The official likewise testified that Khalil’s dossier referenced news articles about his participation in pro-Palestinian protests and his page on the Canary Mission website.

  • The official, Peter Hatch, helps lead an office within ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations division that compiles background reports on targets of the agency’s investigations. He was questioned by Alexandra Conlon of Sher Tremonte LLP.

  • The court later heard testimony from Amy Greer, one of Khalil’s lawyers, who described Khalil’s March 8 arrest by federal agents. She was questioned by Noam Biale of Sher Tremonte LLP.

  • Tomorrow’s expected witnesses: John Armstrong, the Senior Bureau Official in the State Department’s Bureau of Consular Affairs, and Maureen Smith, a Senior Advisor in the State Department’s Bureau of Consular Affairs.

 

A transcript of today’s testimony will be available shortly here.

The trial began on Monday, July 7, 9:00 am ET and is expected to end on July 18, 1:00pm ET.

Read daily trial updates here.

Members of the press need to register daily to access the trial livestream here. 

Read more about the case here.

Lawyers on the case include Ramya Krishnan, Jameel Jaffer, Alex Abdo, Scott Wilkens, Carrie DeCell, Xiangnong (George) Wang, Talya Nevins, Jackson Busch, and Stephany Kim for the Knight First Amendment Institute, Ahilan Arulanantham, Michael Tremonte, Noam Biale, Alexandra Conlon, and Courtney Gans for Sher Tremonte, and Edwina Clarke and David Zimmer for Zimmer, Citron & Clarke.

For more information, contact: Adriana Lamirande, [email protected].