New York
Mohsen Mahdawi, Columbia Student Detained by Trump Administration, Is Freed
Mohsen Mahdawi, an organizer of the pro-Palestinian movement at Columbia University, was freed from federal custody on Wednesday, more than two weeks after immigration officials detained him and sought to rescind his green card as part of a widening crackdown against student protesters.
In releasing Mr. Mahdawi on bail, Judge Geoffrey W. Crawford of Federal District Court in Vermont drew parallels between the current political climate and McCarthyism.
“This is not the first time that the nation has seen chilling action by the government intended to shut down debate,” Judge Crawford said.
The release of Mr. Mahdawi, a permanent legal resident, is a defeat for the Trump administration, though it does not mean the end of the federal government’s action against him. His immigration case will continue, but he will be able to fight it from outside a detention facility.
Mr. Mahdawi struck a defiant tone after his release.
“I am saying it clear and loud, to President Trump and his cabinet: I am not afraid of you,” he said.
The secretary of state, Marco Rubio, has argued that protesters like Mr. Mahdawi have spread antisemitism, while demonstrators say criticism of Israel’s actions in Gaza is not antisemitic.
Tricia McLaughlin, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, denounced Judge Crawford’s decision in a post on social media.
“When you advocate for violence, glorify and support terrorists that relish the killing of Americans and harass Jews, that privilege should be revoked and you should not be in this country,” Ms. McLaughlin said, without offering any evidence to support her accusations.
Mr. Mahdawi, 34, had been in custody since April 14, when immigration officials detained him at an appointment in Vermont, where he is a resident, that he thought was a step toward becoming a U.S. citizen.
In granting the release of Mr. Mahdawi, Judge Crawford cited his extensive ties to his community and said he did not pose a danger to the public. He noted that the court had received more than 90 submissions from community members, academic experts and professors who know Mr. Mahdawi, “many of them Jewish,” attesting to his character and consistently describing him as “peaceful.”
The judge also spoke of the “extraordinary circumstances” of Mr. Mahdawi’s detention and the present moment in history.
Michael Drescher, the acting U.S. attorney in Vermont, who argued on behalf of the Trump administration, said that immigration officials had solid legal reason to detain Mr. Mahdawi as they considered his deportation case.
Mr. Drescher noted that Mr. Mahdawi is not a U.S. citizen and has access to resources that would enable him to leave the country. “His detention is not illegal,” Mr. Drescher said.
Judge Crawford’s Burlington courtroom was packed on Wednesday with supporters of Mr. Mahdawi, who remained hushed as the judge issued his order. A few began clapping as Mr. Mahdawi was allowed to collect his belongings and leave immediately.
Dressed in a plaid suit and wearing gold wire-rimmed glasses, Mr. Mahdawi draped a kaffiyeh around his shoulders. As he walked out of the courthouse to a jubilant reception, he raised his hands in the peace sign.
“They arrested me. What’s the reason? Because I raised my voice, and I said no to war, yes to peace,” Mr. Mahdawi said. “Because I said, ‘Enough is enough. Killing more than 50,000 Palestinians is more than enough.’”
A green card holder for the past 10 years, Mr. Mahdawi was not accused of a crime. Rather, Mr. Rubio wrote in a memo justifying his arrest that his activism “could undermine the Middle East peace process by reinforcing antisemitic sentiment.”
Mr. Rubio has said that immigration authorities have the right to eject even legal residents from the country for protest activities that the government says harm America’s foreign policy interests.
Mr. Mahdawi’s lawyers had requested a temporary restraining order to prevent federal officials from transferring him to a more conservative jurisdiction.
That tactic was used in the detention and attempted deportation of at least four other college demonstrators, including Mahmoud Khalil, a legal permanent resident and Columbia graduate who has been in a Louisiana detention facility since last month.
Another federal judge in Vermont, William K. Sessions III, swiftly granted that request, ordering that Mr. Mahdawi, who grew up in a Palestinian refugee camp in the West Bank, not be removed from the United States or transferred out of Vermont until he ordered otherwise.
Judge Crawford then extended the decision to keep Mr. Mahdawi in the state until Wednesday’s ruling.
Shortly after Mr. Mahdawi’s release, his lawyers said that he would be allowed to finish his academic program at Columbia.
“Today’s victory cannot be overstated. It is a victory for Mohsen who gets to walk free today out of this court,” said one of the lawyers, Shezza Abboushi Dallal.
“And it is also a victory for everyone else in this country invested in the very ability to dissent, who want to be able to speak out for the causes that they feel a moral imperative to lend their voices to and want to do that without fear that they will be abducted by masked men.”
Even though Mr. Mahdawi is still at risk of deportation, his release from detention will give him a much stronger chance to challenge the government’s allegations, said Joshua Bardavid, an immigration lawyer in New York.
“It is so much more difficult to fight a case from detention, first and foremost, because the government gets to choose the venue,” Mr. Bardavid said. “Generally speaking, a case is heard where you are detained, and certain courts are known for being much more government-friendly than other locations.”
Because Mr. Mahdawi was released in Vermont, his case is likely to be heard in the Northeast, Mr. Bardavid said.
The Trump administration had sought to deport Mr. Mahdawi using the same legal provision that it used to detain Mr. Khalil in Manhattan before transferring him to Louisiana.
The government has contended that his presence is a threat to the foreign policy and national security interests of the United States. Federal officials have argued that pro-Palestinian demonstrators have enabled the spread of antisemitism, but they have not provided evidence of that.
Anna Kelly, a White House spokeswoman, said the administration regards studying in the United States as “a great privilege, not a right,” and that any noncitizen who harms national security or commits a crime “should be promptly deported.”
In April, an immigration judge in Louisiana found that federal officials could deport Mr. Khalil, and the Department of Homeland Security later denied him permission to attend the birth of his first child, who was delivered at a New York hospital.
In recent weeks, Mr. Mahdawi had been in hiding, worried about being arrested by immigration police after Mr. Khalil was detained at campus housing at Columbia. He asked the university for help but did not receive it. An extreme pro-Israel group, Betar, had warned on social media that he was next to be detained.
But he was determined to appear for an interview he had been told was related to his naturalization, even though he feared it was a trap. He alerted Vermont’s senators and representative in case things went wrong, and before the appointment, he studied the Constitution, preparing for a naturalization test.
Instead, immigration officers, some with their faces covered, placed Mr. Mahdawi in handcuffs and arrested him, according to a statement released by Vermont’s congressional delegation, Senators Peter Welch and Representative Becca Balint, both Democrats, and Senator Bernie Sanders, an independent.
On Wednesday, the lawmakers expressed relief that Mr. Mahdawi had been freed from detention and said that his constitutional right to due process had prevailed. They said that he had done nothing wrong and had been unfairly targeted by the federal government.
“The Trump administration’s actions in this case — and in so many other cases of wrongfully detained, deported, and disappeared people — are shameful and immoral,” they said in a statement. On Columbia’s campus, the news of Mr. Mahdawi’s release from federal custody was hailed as an important first step.
Gabriella Ramirez, a second-year graduate student and member of the University Senate who knows Mr. Mahdawi, said she was “very encouraged to see the justice system at work with Mohsen’s release from unlawful detention.”
She added: “I remain hopeful that we will see a similar outcome for my classmate Mahmoud Khalil.”
Anvee Bhutani and Carolyn Shapiro contributed reporting.
Every week since 1976, Metropolitan Diary has published stories by, and for, New Yorkers of all ages and eras (no matter where they live now): anecdotes and memories, quirky encounters and overheard snippets that reveal the city’s spirit and heart.
For the past four years, we’ve asked for your help picking the best Diary entry of the year. Now we’re asking again.
We’ve narrowed the field to the five finalists here. Read them and vote for your favorite. The author of the item that gets the most votes will receive a print of the illustration that accompanied it, signed by the artist, Agnes Lee.
The voting closes at 11:59 p.m. on Sunday, Dec. 21. You can change your vote as many times as you’d like until then, but you may only pick one. Choose wisely.
Click “VOTE” to choose your favorite Metropolitan Diary entry of 2025, and come back on Sunday, Dec. 28, to see which one our readers picked as their favorite.
Click “VOTE” to choose your favorite Metropolitan Diary entry of 2025, and come back on Sunday, Dec. 28, to see which one our readers picked as their favorite.
Two Stops
Dear Diary:
It was a drizzly June night in 2001. I was a young magazine editor and had just enjoyed what I thought was a very blissful second date — dinner, drinks, fabulous conversation — with our technology consultant at a restaurant in Manhattan.
I lived in Williamsburg at the time, and my date lived near Murray Hill, so we grabbed a cab and headed south on Second Avenue.
“Just let me out here,” my date said to the cabby at the corner of 25th Street.
We said our goodbyes, quick and shy, knowing that we would see each other at work the next day. I was giddy and probably grinning with happiness and hope.
“Oh boy,” the cabby said, shaking his head as we drove toward Brooklyn. “Very bad.”
“What do you mean?” I asked in horror.
“He doesn’t want you to know exactly where he lives,” the cabby said. “Not a good sign.”
I spent the rest of the cab ride in shock, revisiting every moment of the date.
Happily, it turned out that my instinct about it being a great date was right, and the cabby was wrong. Twenty-four years later, my date that night is my husband, and I know that if your stop is first, it’s polite to get out so the cab can continue in a straight line to the next stop.
Ferry Farewell
Dear Diary:
On a February afternoon, I met my cousins at the Staten Island Ferry Terminal. Their spouses and several of our very-grown children were there too. I brought Prosecco, a candle, a small speaker to play music, photos and a poem.
We were there to recreate the wedding cruise of my mother, Monica, and my stepfather, Peter. They had gotten married at City Hall in August 1984. She was 61, and he, 71. It was her first marriage, and his fourth.
I was my mother’s witness that day. It was a late-in-life love story, and they were very happy. Peter died in 1996, at 82. My mother died last year. She was 100.
Peter’s ashes had waited a long time, but finally they were mingled with Monica’s. The two of them would ride the ferry a last time and then swirl together in the harbor forever. Cue the candles, bubbly, bagpipes and poems.
Two ferry workers approached us. We knew we were in trouble: Open containers and open flames were not allowed on the ferry.
My cousin’s husband, whispering, told the workers what we were doing and said we would be finished soon.
They walked off, and then returned. They said they had spoken to the captain, and they ushered us to the stern for some privacy. As the cup of ashes flew into the water, the ferry horn sounded two long blasts.
Unacceptable
Dear Diary:
I went to a new bagel store in Brooklyn Heights with my son.
When it was my turn to order, I asked for a cinnamon raisin bagel with whitefish salad and a slice of red onion.
The man behind the counter looked up at me.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I can’t do that.”
Teresa
Dear Diary:
It was February 2013. With a foot of snow expected, I left work early and drove from New Jersey warily as my wipers squeaked and snow and ice stuck to my windows.
I drove east on the Cross Bronx Expressway, which was tied up worse than usual. Trucks groaned on either side of my rattling Toyota. My fingers were cold. My toes were colder. Got to get home before it really comes down, I thought to myself.
By the time I got home to my little red bungalow a stone’s throw from the Throgs Neck Bridge, the snow was already up to my ankles.
Inside, I took off my gloves, hat, scarf, coat, sweater, pants and snow boots. The bed, still unmade, was inviting me. But first, I checked my messages.
There was one from Teresa, the 92-year-old widow on the corner.
“Call me,” she said, sounding desperate.
I looked toward the warm bed, but … Teresa. There was a storm outside, and she was alone.
On went the pants, the sweater, the coat, the scarf, the boots and the gloves, and then I went out the door.
The snow was six inches deep on the sidewalks, so I tottered on tire tracks in the middle of the street. The wind stung my face. When I got to the end of the block, I pounded on her door.
“Teresa!” I called. No answer. “Teresa!” I called again. I heard the TV blaring. Was she sprawled on the floor?
I went next door and called for Kathy.
“Teresa can’t answer the door,” I said. “Probably fell.”
Kathy had a key. In the corner of her neat living room, Teresa, in pink sweatpants and sweaters, was sitting curled in her armchair, head bent down and The Daily News in her lap.
I snapped off the TV.
Startled, she looked up.
“Kathy! Neal!” she said. “What’s a five-letter word for cabbage?”
Nice Place
Dear Diary:
When I lived in Park Slope over 20 years ago, I once had to call an ambulance because of a sudden, violent case of food poisoning.
Two paramedics, a man and a woman, entered our third-floor walk-up with a portable chair. Strapping me in, the male medic quickly inserted an IV line into my arm.
Out of the corner of my eye, I could see his partner circling around and admiring the apartment.
“Nice place you’ve got here.” she said. “Do you own it?”
“Yeah,” I muttered, all but unconscious.
Once I was in the ambulance, she returned to her line of inquiry.
“Do you mind me asking how much you paid for your apartment?”
“$155,000,” I croaked.
“Wow! You must have bought during the recession.”
“Yeah” I said.
They dropped me off at Methodist Hospital, where I was tended to by a nurse as I struggled to stay lucid.
At some point, the same medic poked her head into the room with one last question:
“You wouldn’t be wanting to sell any time soon, would you?”
Illustrations by Agnes Lee.
‘Part of the job’
Edwin Guity was at the controls of a southbound D train last December, rolling through the Bronx, when suddenly someone was on the tracks in front of him.
He jammed on the emergency brake, but it was too late. The man had gone under the wheels.
Stumbling over words, Mr. Guity radioed the dispatcher and then did what the rules require of every train operator involved in such an incident. He got out of the cab and went looking for the person he had struck.
“I didn’t want to do it,” Mr. Guity said later. “But this is a part of the job.”
He found the man pinned beneath the third car. Paramedics pulled him out, but the man died at the hospital. After that, Mr. Guity wrestled with what to do next.
A 32-year-old who had once lived in a family shelter with his parents, he viewed the job as paying well and offering a rare chance at upward mobility. It also helped cover the costs of his family’s groceries and rent in the three-bedroom apartment they shared in Brooklyn.
But striking the man with the train had shaken him more than perhaps any other experience in his life, and the idea of returning to work left him feeling paralyzed.
Edwin Guity was prescribed exposure therapy after his train struck a man on the tracks.
Hundreds of train operators have found themselves in Mr. Guity’s position over the years.
And for just as long, there has been a path through the state workers’ compensation program to receiving substantive treatment to help them cope. But New York’s train operators say that their employer, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, has done too little to make them aware of that option.
After Mr. Guity’s incident, no official told him of that type of assistance, he said. Instead, they gave him the option of going back to work right away.
But Mr. Guity was lucky. He had a friend who had been through the same experience and who coached him on getting help — first through a six-week program and then, with the assistance of a lawyer, through an experienced specialist.
The specialist prescribed a six-month exposure therapy program to gradually reintroduce Mr. Guity to the subway.
His first day back at the controls of a passenger train was on Thanksgiving. Once again, he was driving on the D line — the same route he had been traveling on the day of the fatal accident.
M.T.A. representatives insisted that New York train operators involved in strikes are made aware of all options for getting treatment, but they declined to answer specific questions about how the agency ensures that drivers get the help they need.
In an interview, the president of the M.T.A. division that runs the subway, Demetrius Crichlow, said all train operators are fully briefed on the resources available to them during their job orientation.
“I really have faith in our process,” Mr. Crichlow said.
Still, other transit systems — all of which are smaller than New York’s — appear to do a better job of ensuring that operators like Mr. Guity take advantage of the services available to them, according to records and interviews.
A Times analysis shows that the incidents were on the rise in New York City’s system even as they were falling in all other American transit systems.
An Uptick in Subway Strikes
San Francisco’s system provides 24-hour access to licensed therapists through a third-party provider.
Los Angeles proactively reaches out to its operators on a regular basis to remind them of workers’ compensation options and other resources.
The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority has made it a goal to increase engagement with its employee assistance program.
The M.T.A. says it offers some version of most of these services.
But in interviews with more than two dozen subway operators who have been involved in train strikes, only one said he was aware of all those resources, and state records suggest most drivers of trains that strike people are not taking full advantage of them.
“It’s the M.T.A.’s responsibility to assist the employee both mentally and physically after these horrific events occur,” the president of the union that represents New York City transit workers, John V. Chiarello, said in a statement, “but it is a constant struggle trying to get the M.T.A. to do the right thing.”
new video loaded: Protesters Arrested After Trying to Block a Possible ICE Raid
transcript
transcript
Protesters Arrested After Trying to Block a Possible ICE Raid
Nearly 200 protesters tried to block federal agents from leaving a parking garage in Lower Manhattan on Saturday. The confrontation appeared to prevent a possible ICE raid nearby, and led to violent clashes between the police and protesters.
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[chanting] “ICE out of New York.”
By Jorge Mitssunaga
November 30, 2025
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