SCOTT SIMON, HOST:
Huge questions this week about who the government can deport and on what grounds. The Trump administration is using unprecedented tactics and pushing legal boundaries. Lawyers have gone to court to push back. Thursday, the U.S. Supreme Court ordered the government to help Kilmar Abrego Garcia return to the U.S. after he was wrongly deported in a crackdown on alleged gang members. And in Louisiana yesterday, an immigration judge ruled that Mahmoud Khalil can be deported solely because the U.S. secretary of state determined his pro-Palestinian activism at Columbia University was antisemitic. NPR's Adrian Florido was in the court yesterday. Adrian, thanks for being with us.
ADRIAN FLORIDO, BYLINE: Thank you, Scott.
SIMON: What did the judge say?
FLORIDO: Well, he said that - excuse me - she said that the secretary of state, Marco Rubio, had the authority to order someone deported based on his determination that that person is a threat to, essentially, the foreign policy interests of the United States and that she had no authority to challenge that decision. This is based on a rarely used law enacted during the 1950s Red Scare that allows the secretary of state to order someone personally deported if that person's presence in the U.S. puts the nation's foreign policy goals at risk. The Trump administration has said that fighting antisemitism around the world is one of its goals.
So when agents from the Department of Homeland Security came to Rubio with a file on Mahmoud Khalil's activism, Rubio said he determined that his protests were antisemitic. And he said if he allowed Khalil to stay in the country, it would send a message that the U.S. tolerates antisemitism, which would then undermine its attempt to fight it everywhere else in the world. And that is why he said Khalil had to be deported.
SIMON: And what did Mahmoud Khalil's lawyers say?
FLORIDO: Well, that that accusation was absurd. In court, they said that Khalil is not antisemitic, and they questioned what facts Rubio relied on to decide that his protests were antisemitic. But the judge said that the statute is very clear. As long as Rubio makes the determination himself, she cannot question it.
SIMON: What about Khalil's rights to due process and freedom of speech?
FLORIDO: Well, those are some of the big questions in this case. The only thing the secretary of state has to do to kick someone out of the country is to determine that their presence harmed U.S. foreign policy in some, you know, undefined way. This is one of Khalil's lawyers, Baher Azmy, after the ruling yesterday.
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BAHER AZMY: There's no stopping at Mahmoud Khalil. There's no stopping at just pro-Palestinian protesters. Next, it could be LGBTQI activists under some pretext that interferes with our foreign relations with Russia, racial justice activists, anyone.
FLORIDO: He said it's a very aggressive strategy that, if left unchecked, could become very dangerous. And that's why he and the rest of the legal team for Mahmoud Khalil are fighting so hard to appeal this decision. If they have to, they're going to go all the way up to the federal court system - through the federal court system - excuse me - to prevent Khalil's deportation. For now, he's still in detention, though, as his lawyers figure out their next steps.
SIMON: And briefly, Adrian, the Supreme Court ruled on the case of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who was mistakenly deported to a Salvadoran prison. How does this fit into the question of executive power?
FLORIDO: Well, legal experts are asking, if the government is allowed to get away with something like this, what is to stop it from rounding up other people who, like Abrego Garcia, had legal authorization to be in the U.S. and expelling them without due process? That's why his lawyers are trying so hard to force the government to bring Abrego back.
SIMON: NPR's Adrian Florido. Thanks so much.
FLORIDO: Thank you, Scott. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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