FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: March 24, 2025
MEDIA CONTACT: Yasmeen Khan, ykhan@lccrsf.org, C:310-863-1432

***PRESS RELEASE***

Lawsuit Filed to Challenge Imminent ICE Detention of 21-Year-Old Student for Attending Demonstrations Supporting Palestinian Rights

Manhattan – Today, the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area (LCCRSF), together with CUNY Law School’s CLEAR project and additional co-counsel listed below, filed a federal lawsuit and request for emergency court order on behalf of 21-year-old undergraduate student Yunseo Chung, sought to be detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) for attending demonstrations in support of Palestinian rights at Columbia University. Ms. Chung, who has lived here since the age of 7, now faces the threat of deportation under the Trump administration’s unprecedented use of a “foreign policy” ground of deportation to deport immigrants upon Secretary of State Rubio’s determination that because of their “beliefs, statements, or associations,” their continued presence would “compromise a compelling U.S. foreign policy interest.”  

The case challenges the Trump administration’s alarming new policy of using immigration law to target noncitizens who engage in protest or advocacy in support of Palestinian rights, part of a series of authoritarian actions through which the administration seeks to silence political viewpoints it opposes. Speech concerning political change receives the highest level of protection under the First Amendment, which the Supreme Court for nearly a century has interpreted to protect noncitizens.

Pending the Southern District of New York reaching broader questions of the policy’s legality writ large, a motion for temporary restraining order filed late Monday afternoon seeks immediate relief to block Ms. Chung’s detention or transfer outside the District to a distant detention site, as ICE has done in other cases targeting noncitizens for removal based on their political speech and associations. Absent court intervention, Ms. Chung is at risk of enduring harsh detention conditions that will cause significant trauma, disrupt her education, and limit her access to legal counsel.  

Like generations of American college students before her, Ms. Chung has joined with her peers to express heartfelt political beliefs. That her political speech in support of Palestinian rights jeopardizes U.S. foreign policy is a preposterous proposition, yet the Trump administration is likely to take the staggeringly censorial position that courts must defer to Secretary Rubio’s unfettered discretion to determine which speech by noncitizens the government will deem permissible. Enabling the Trump administration to wield deportation in this way, as a sword of Damocles over all noncitizens who might dare to engage in political speech, is anathema to the free exchange of ideas and an outrageous violation of the First Amendment.  

LCCRSF co-counsel on the case include CUNY Law School’s CLEAR (Creating Law Enforcement Accountability & Responsibility) project, Human Rights First, Emery Celli Brinckerhoff Abady Ward & Maazel LLP, the Law Office of Matthew Bray, and Jonathan Hafetz, Esq. 

The complaint is available here

The motion for temporary restraining order is available here

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