POLITICS NEWS – Appeals court pauses Tufts student’s transfer to immigration detention center

Laila Kirkpatrick, Staff Writer

A federal court of appeals has temporarily paused a judge’s order that brought a Turkish student attending Tufts University from a detention center in Louisiana back to the New England area to consider an emergency motion filed by the government. The U.S. 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals, based in New York, ruled that a three-judge panel would be hearing arguments on May 6th in the case of Rumeysa Ozturk. As of Tuesday, she has officially been detained for five weeks. 

A District Court judge in Vermont earlier ordered the 30-year-old doctoral student to be brought to the state by Thursday for a hearing to determine whether or not she was illegally detained by ICE officials. Ozturk’s lawyers have repeatedly claimed that her detention violates her constitutional rights, including free speech and due process. The Justice  Department has since appealed the ruling, claiming that an immigration court in Louisiana has proper jurisdiction over the case.