for the court to assess legal challenges to her detention. In a ruling on Friday, District Court Judge William S Sessions found that Ozturk – who is currently held in Louisiana – has presented “significant evidence” to back the allegations that her detention violated her free speech and due process rights.

Ozturk was arrested and had her visa revoked in March. Supporters say she was targeted over an op-ed she co-authored in 2024, criticising Tufts University for dismissing a student government resolution that called on the school to divest from Israeli companies. For these claims to be assessed, Sessions wrote, Ozturk’s case needs to be heard in court. “The Court concludes that this case will continue in this Court with Ms Ozturk physically present for the remainder of the proceedings,” he wrote.

The judge gave the government until May 1st to transfer Ozturk and set a bond hearing on May 9th for her to argue for a temporary release. Ozturk was sent to a detention facility in Louisiana, in what critics say is part of a government effort to keep detainees away from their supporters and lawyers – and place them in conservative-leaning legal districts. The Tufts University student was arrested near her home in Massachusetts on March 30th. Surveillance footage of the incident shows masked immigration officers, who did not identify themselves as law enforcement, approaching her on the street and grabbing her hands. Critics have described the incident as an abduction.

Her student visa has been revoked as part of a massive crackdown by President Donald Trump’s administration on foreign students who have protested or criticised Israel’s war on Gaza. Sessions confirmed that the only identifiable evidence that the US government is using to detain and deport Ozturk is the op-ed. “Her evidence supports her argument that the government’s motivation or purpose for her detention is to punish her for co-authoring an op-ed in a campus newspaper which criticized the Tufts University administration, and to chill the political speech of others,” Sessions said.

“The government has so far offered no evidence to support an alternative, lawful motivation or purpose for Ms Ozturk’s detention.” He also stressed that the First Amendment, which protects free speech, “has long extended” to non-citizens living in the US. The case Sessions is overseeing is known as a habeas corpus petition. It challenges Ozturk’s detention, not the broader push to deport her. (Aljazeera)