Lawyers for Mahmoud Khalil, the Columbia University graduate detained by the Trump administration last weekend, have not been able to hold a private conversation with their client since his arrest.
That revelation came from a hearing in Manhattan federal court Wednesday, as lawyers for Mr. Khalil and the government appeared in front of a judge, Jesse Furman, to discuss Mr. Khalil’s detention, which has raised concerns about free speech protections amid President Trump’s immigration crackdown.
Mr. Khalil, a prominent figure in pro-Palestinian demonstrations on the Columbia campus, was arrested by federal immigration agents in New York on Saturday and is being held at a facility in Louisiana.
He has not been charged with any crime. But the Trump administration has accused him of siding with terrorists, and justified his detention by citing an obscure statute that grants the secretary of state the power to declare that someone whose presence in the United States is “adversarial” to the country’s foreign policy and national security interests is subject to deportation.
Early Sunday morning, lawyers for Mr. Khalil filed a petition questioning the circumstances of his detention. They have asked Judge Furman to make the government return him to New York.
At the conference Wednesday morning, one of Mr. Khalil’s lawyers, Ramzi Kassem, said that the distance was interfering with his client’s access to the court proceeding that could result in his release.
Mr. Kassem said that he had sought to hold a private call with Mr. Khalil to discuss his case, and that the earliest appointment the lawyers were offered was on March 20, nearly two weeks after it was requested.
Judge Furman said that he would order the government to let Mr. Khalil’s lawyers speak with him Wednesday and Thursday as they prepare a new filing calling for his release.
It is not clear whether that issue will ultimately be decided in New York. At the conference, a lawyer for the government, Brandon Waterman, said that Mr. Khalil had already been transferred to New Jersey by the time his lawyers filed their initial petition seeking his release in Manhattan federal court.
Mr. Khalil was arrested on Saturday evening and the petition was filed at 4:40 a.m. Sunday. Amy Greer, one of Mr. Khalil’s lawyers, has said she believed that Mr. Khalil was in New York at the time. But Mr. Waterman said that Mr. Khalil was in New Jersey no later than 3:20 a.m. Sunday.
Mr. Waterman added that the government would prefer that any further scrutiny of Mr. Khalil’s detention take place outside New York, either in New Jersey or Louisiana.
Judge Furman did not make any immediate decision. But he told Mr. Waterman he should be prepared to address a 2004 Supreme Court opinion that could bode well for Mr. Khalil’s lawyers as they fight to keep his case in New York, where Mr. Khalil lives with his pregnant wife, an American citizen.
In the concurring opinion, Justice Anthony M. Kennedy laid out circumstances in which a detainee’s case should be heard in the place from which he was removed. The circumstances included when the government removed a prisoner to hinder his lawyers from questioning his detention in the appropriate court, or when the government would not communicate where the detainee was being held.
Mr. Khalil is a legal permanent resident, but the hearing on Wednesday did not relate directly to the status of his residency. The legal process that governs Mr. Khalil’s potential deportation is expected to take place in front of an immigration judge, rather than Judge Furman.
President Trump’s border czar, Thomas Homan, said on Wednesday that the administration considered Mr. Khalil “a national security threat.” As Mr. Homan answered reporters’ questions in Albany, he accused Mr. Khalil of handing out leaflets “inciting violence on campus.”
The White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, said on Tuesday that Mr. Khalil had sided with terrorists and accused him of participating in protests at which pro-Hamas fliers were handed out. She did not respond to an email requesting clarification as to whether Mr. Khalil passed out the fliers himself.
The White House has said that Mr. Khalil is only the first of many whom it plans to detain and deport.
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