President Donald Trump celebrated the arrest of a former graduate student at Columbia University, saying the detention of the Palestinian activist and legal United States resident was "the first arrest of many to come" on Monday.
"Following my previously signed Executive Orders, ICE proudly apprehended and detained Mahmoud Khalil, a Radical Foreign Pro-Hamas Student on the campus of Columbia University," Trump wrote on Truth Social. "We know there are more students at Columbia and other Universities across the Country who have engaged in pro-terrorist, anti-Semitic, anti-American activity, and the Trump Administration will not tolerate it."
Khalil was arrested at his home by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents on Saturday night. Khalil's attorney, Amy Greer, told the Associated Press that ICE agents said they were acting on orders to revoke Khalil's student visa. Khalil had graduated from Columbia with a master's from the university's School of International and Public Affairs. Greer says she informed agents that Khalil was a lawful permanent resident of the United States with a green card. She says the agents then claimed they were revoking his green card.
Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin told Columbia newspaper The Spectator that the arrest was "in support of President Trump’s executive orders prohibiting anti-Semitism."
Secretary of State Marco Rubio shared news of Khalil's arrest on Sunday, saying on X that the Trump administration will be "revoking the visas and/or green cards of Hamas supporters so they can be deported."
On Truth Social, Trump muddied the waters between students and "paid agitators" before asking that "every one of America's colleges and universities" cooperate with ICE.
"Many are not students, they are paid agitators," he wrote. "We will find, apprehend, and deport these terrorist sympathizers from our country — never to return again. If you support terrorism, including the slaughtering of innocent men, women, and children, your presence is contrary to our national and foreign policy interests, and you are not welcome here."
