The Trump’ administration refused Friday to comply with a court order demanding the release of Mahmoud Khalil, a negotiator in the pro-Palestinian protests at Columbia University who has been held for three months in a detention center awaiting deportation.
On Wednesday, Judge Michael Farbiarz of the federal district court in New Jersey, near New York, issued an order saying the government could not detain or deport Khalil based on claims by Secretary of State Marco Rubio that his presence on American soil posed a threat to US security.
The judge then gave the government until Friday morning to release Khalil.
However, as of Friday afternoon, the government had not released Khalil and indicated in court documents that they had no intention of doing so.
“The Court has never held that it would be unlawful for the defendants (the government, editor’s note) to detain Khalil on another charge leading to his deportation,” the US Justice Department lawyer wrote in these documents.
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