Mahmoud Khalil’s Last Ditch

The anti-Israel activist Mahmoud Khalil is making a last-ditch démarche to dodge deportation, asking today for a hearing at the Supreme Court. Mr. Khalil is among a number of campus agitators whose advocacy for the Palestinian Arab cause is creating what Secretary of State Rubio calls “a hostile environment for Jewish students in the United States.” President Trump aims to expel the likes of Mr. Khalil, who now seeks shelter under the Constitution.As a matter of statute, Mr. Khalil would appear to lack a legal leg on which to stand. As a permanent resident, or green card holder, the former graduate student lacks American citizenship. Mr. Rubio speaks of such non-citizens in terms of the privilege America has granted them to, say, enroll in schools here under student visas. Mr. Rubio asserts that while “no one’s entitled to a student visa,” our liberal press covers such visas “like they’re some sort of birthright.” The state secretary likens the grant of a student visa to “inviting you into my home. If you come into my home and put all kinds of crap on my couch, I’m going to kick you out of my house.” Of the wave of non-citizen activists inciting pro-Palestinian disturbances on campuses, Mr. Rubio adds, “when we identify lunatics like these, we take away their student visa.” The State Department has in such cases revoked hundreds of student visas.Mr. Khalil is claiming a right under the First Amendment to advance his anti-Israeli views, an argument that has failed to prosper in federal courts. The dispute, though, is proceeding in federal courts on a different legal track than the case now pending at the Supreme Court. Mr. Khalil has been contesting his deportation order in what are known as immigration courts, which operate, per federal law, under the aegis of the executive branch. “Baseless allegations and smears” is how Mr. Khalil characterizes the Trump administration’s claims against him. He reckons that the accusations “cannot survive the slightest scrutiny in federal court,” so Messrs. Trump and Rubio are “trying to channel it into their kangaroo immigration courts.” Yet the immigration tribunals function under federal law as a means to address legal issues relating to the status of non-citizens. They are hardly “kangaroo courts.”Under federal law, Mr. Khalil has received due process via these immigration court proceedings, which backed Mr. Rubio’s position. The Board of Immigration Appeals, too, denied Mr. Khalil’s effort to avoid removal. The full bench of the Third United States Appeals Circuit reversed a district judge’s ruling that sought to prevent Mr. Khalil’s deportation. The circuit riders held that immigration courts are the proper venue for the dispute.In a similar case, the Trump administration seeks to deport another pro-Palestinian activist at Georgetown University, Badar Khan Suri. That case is also pending at the Supreme Court. The Justice Department has argued that “the Immigration and Nationality Act strips district courts of jurisdiction over any claims by an alien” relating to removal proceedings. Yet Mr. Suri, like Mr. Khalil, is demanding legal review under the doctrine of Habeas Corpus.Latin for “you shall have the body,” Habeas Corpus is legal jargon for a right to challenge wrongful detention. Does the right extend to all non-citizens? Past precedents suggest it does not apply to, say, recent border-crossers apprehended near the frontier. Conceding the right to the likes of Mr. Khalil would, per Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson III of the Fourth Circuit, force Uncle Sam to contest non-citizens’ “removability in two forums and win in both.”

Mahmoud Khalil’s Last Ditch

Mahmoud Khalil’s Last Ditch

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