Immigration court rejects Trump administration's deportation bid of pro-Palestinian Tufts student

An immigration court has rejected the Trump administration's deportation bid of Rümeysa Öztürk, a Turkish national and pro-Palestinian Tufts University student.

Öztürk’s lawyers announced the court's decision on Monday, saying that it had found the government “had not met its burden of proving removability” and terminated her deportation proceedings, The Hill news outlet reported.

Öztürk was arrested last March after she co-authored a pro-Palestinian op-ed in her student newspaper.

The immigration court system is under the executive branch, and the federal government can appeal the decision to the Board of Immigration Appeals. The board is part of the Department of Justice.

“This is more judicial activism at its core to keep a terrorist sympathizer in this country," a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson said. "We are under no obligation to admit them or let them stay here.”

Secretary of State Marco Rubio has invoked a law that lets him have someone deported if he believes they pose potentially “serious adverse foreign policy consequences.”

Öztürk has claimed the push for her deportation is retaliation that violates the First Amendment, as the Trump administration has said that a pro-Palestinian op-ed she wrote with three others was justification to deport her.

She also filed a case in federal court to contest the constitutionality of her detention.

U.S. District Judge William Sessions, a Clinton appointee, ordered Öztürk’s release in May after she spent weeks at a Louisiana facility. She has since been out on bail, and the case remains active.