Mapheze Saleh, the wife Badar Khan Suri, speaks after a recent court hearing in Alexandria. Photo: Michael S. Williamson/The Washington Post via Getty Images
A Georgetown University scholar was released on a judge's order yesterday, two months after masked federal agents arrested him outside of his home in Rosslyn, Virginia.
The big picture: Judges have freed several foreign nationals arrested over Palestinian activism under the Trump administration's immigration crackdown.
Driving the news:Badar Khan Suri, a Georgetown University graduate student from India, was released from a Texas detention center.
Judge Patricia Giles of the Eastern District of Virginia said government prosecutors declined to provide evidence for Suri's continued detainment, and that he was arrested "for punitive reasons" in violation of the First Amendment, the NY Times reports.
Suri was teaching about minority rights in South Asia at Georgetown when he was arrested and informed his student visa was revoked. He was not charged with a crime.
Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin alleged on X that Suri has connections with Hamas.
Suri's lawyer told the media his client is "innocent" and that he was being "punished" because his U.S. citizen wife is of Palestinian heritage.
Zoom out: Other immigrants remain detained, including Columbia University alumnus Mahmoud Khalil, a legal U.S. resident who has been in ICE custody for over two months.
