SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to Beat the Prosecution, presented by Northern Virginia criminal defense and DUI lawyer Jonathan Katz, where we are here to regularly present you information and ideas for beating your prosecution as best as possible. Nothing on any of our media sources, such as our podcast or website, is legal advice. John Katz only provides legal advice to current clients or for individuals who have paid for a consultation. And now for your host, John Katz.

SPEAKER_01 0:32

Hello, everybody. This is John Katz at Beat the Prosecution. I'm a criminal defense and DUI defense lawyer in Fairfax, Northern Virginia. Often I say I'm delighted to have a certain guest. I would be delighted, other than that we shouldn't even be here together. I don't want to uh say anyone's names wrong, but uh I'll say her name as well as I can. Rameza Oz Turk is a PhD candidate in my undergraduate Alma Malater uh Tufts University, and she has been mistreated and she's not the only one. We don't have her on today, but we have her lawyer, Masa Kanbabi. I think I just mispronounced your name. Please remind us how I pronounce your name.

SPEAKER_02 1:16

You actually did pretty good. Uh it's Masa Kanbabi. Thank you, Jonathan.

SPEAKER_01 1:21

And uh I have Masa on, not uh merely because this is a cause celebration. The only reason I have it on because of cause celebra, it gets more attention about focusing not only on helping one person, but everyone who is victims of these efforts to deport people for what? For exercising their First Amendment rights, but just not being a United States citizen with the protection saying, I'm a United States citizen, you can't deport me anywhere. Well, unless you happen to be a uh a convict with uh Trump trying to deport uh U.S. citizen convicts, even possibly to be uh housed uh outside the country where it's less expensive to do so. With that, please introduce yourself, Masa, to everybody.

SPEAKER_02 2:06

Well, thank you so much for having me. Yeah, I uh as you mentioned, I represent Romesa Austerk with her immigration court case, and along with some of my co-counsel on her immigration team. But we also represent her on her federal court case based on her First Amendment speech and her habeas petition with a large team, uh, including the ACLU Massachusetts, ACLU Vermont, ACLU National, CUNY Clear, and Emory Chelle, a civil rights law firm in New York City. And my practice is basically focused on immigration law, pretty much anything and everything to do with immigration law. But my primary focus is actually on work visas, green card applications through employer sponsorship. I work with a lot of healthcare providers, for example, because we just don't have enough physicians and nurses in the US. And then I do unique cases like Rumesa's. I work with a lot of international students, especially this past one year, as related to their pro-Palestine protests and advocacy, and how that's impacted their immigration status. And I do some unique cases like medical uh treatment-based uh immigration uh work. So that's a summary of what I've been doing these past 25 years in my practice.

SPEAKER_01 3:41

Got it. Well, I'm I'm interested in knowing a little more about your background, and I'm sorry for being lazy if I didn't look at it closely enough. I'm on your website. Uh what made you decide to uh practice law? Where did you go to law school?

SPEAKER_02 3:55

Yeah, so I'm an immigrant from Iran. My family and I immigrated to the US in the early 70s. My dad was a physician, uh, again, working in an underserved area. So I guess that's kind of what launched me into the work that I do. We were in a small town in Western Mass, and it was a community of international physicians from around the world on visas and green cards and citizenship eventually. And I think that inspired me to want to help others who are going through what's often a very trans, um, not a transparent process, um, a complicated process, a scary process for many, um, and it just seems to be getting worse, unfortunately, instead of better. So I think it's growing up in that community and going through the process myself that inspired me to do this.

SPEAKER_01 4:47

Where did you go to law school? What made you decide to focus on immigration law?

SPEAKER_02 4:52

Yeah, so I went to Albany Law School. There was no focus at that time, 25 years ago, on immigration law per se. Um, but I did take an immigration law class and loved it. And once I graduated and set up my own private practice, I thought, oh, this is a great time to try out um some pro bono work and take on some asylum cases. And uh that was where I got my first start.

SPEAKER_01 5:22

So, my my work that I did with immigration was I was in the immigration law clinic at my law school in my second year of law school, and Paul Grusendorf was the uh the head of the clinic, and he became an ALJ later on. I've I podcast interviewed with him uh later on, and I actually got a chance to do two deportation hearings. I wish I could say that I won one of them, but I didn't. But at least I did uh get uh I did get asylum for one person, but it was made easier because she was Ethiopian, and at the time Reagan was president, I was able to uh underline in the application this was the uh uh the the the Marxist communist government there and that she was uh being oppressed for uh for being involved with immigration, if not immigration for religious activity. Now, if you're able to uh say so, well, why don't you do this? Because I I haven't done justice to uh uh uh Romesa's uh story. Please uh uh tell the audience uh what her case about most people already know and uh and and the hell she's been through and and any hell and prospects she's going through right now.

SPEAKER_02 6:31

Yeah, thanks um for this opportunity. So, yeah, I mean, as you mentioned, Romesa is a PhD student at Tufts, studying uh child study and human development. She's in her last year of her PhD program, and she was a Fulbright scholar before that, during her master's program again in teaching and education and at Columbia University. And I have to say, I mean, Romesa is one of the most um soft-spoken, kind, deeply compassionate people that I've met. She's truly dedicated her career, or her education and her work and her research to um ensuring that children grow up in a loving, caring environment, um, especially as relates to media and its impact on children, how children can use media in pro-social ways, how media can be used in pro-social ways, you know, in ways that benefit society. Um and she, you know, has not been engaged in um any activism or in any protesting related to the genocide in Gaza, but what she did do was write an op-ed with several of her classmates uh related to the student union passing a resolution and the president of Tufts not um not abiding by the student union resolution.

SPEAKER_01 7:56

And and I read that op-ed, and I'm gonna put that in the liner notes. Talk about uh what one of the most low-key uh opinion pieces there could ever be that it couldn't you can't even read between the lines that somehow there was some sort of uh secret words in there being pro-Hamas, pro-terrorists, uh pro anything of this sort.

SPEAKER_02 8:18

Yeah, no, I mean basically this woman has been jailed for six weeks for having written an op-ed in her school newspaper. That's it.

SPEAKER_01 8:25

Right.

SPEAKER_02 8:26

Yeah, so I I mean I think it's just an incredibly dangerous situation we find ourselves in. And I think as Americans, we should be questioning what is happening in this country when the foundations of our constitution are being eroded because someone wrote an opinion piece that we didn't like.

SPEAKER_01 8:46

Well, that's right. And you know, uh we we we can say, well, all the there there's always hope that uh uh that Trump won't be able to be president past uh two 2000 uh whatever the year is, 2029, unless he uh does things around that, but that doesn't mean we're gonna get better. Uh no, I I re I really think this is as close as as we've ever uh come to regressing to the to the McCarthy days, and of course the McCarron Walter Act that uh that is being um uh claimed by Rubio to be able to engage in this actions that that was passed during the the the the heated uh the the heart of McCarthyism.

SPEAKER_02 9:26

Yeah, I mean uh if this is where we're starting in the first four months of this administration, I don't I'm afraid to see how much worse it's going to get. Um, and I think unfortunately the the modus operandi of the current administration is we're gonna break every rule we want, we're not gonna follow norms, we're not gonna follow standards and ethics or anything like that, and sue us to stop us. And ultimately, that's the problem, right? How how much resources have to go into trying to make our government follow the rules is concerning.

SPEAKER_01 10:04

Right. So getting back to uh Remeas's uh story, so uh if we can continue with uh her her her having been apprehended by the immigration authorities and uh what was going on, for instance, with all this back and forth of uh, well, it was bad enough that she was being detained, but then having her being detained in Louisiana and how much that this is uh judge shopping by both sides to uh for the feds to have her in Louisiana and for her side to have her back in uh New England.

SPEAKER_02 10:34

Yeah, well, I mean, essentially, um, I think she was passed on like a baton in a relay race between ICE agents, starting where they picked her up and kidnapped her basically off of the streets of Somerville, not identifying themselves, uh, you know, and and not even explaining to her what's happening, not having an arrest warrant, not charging her with anything, and just you know, abducting her and taking her across multiple state lines and ignoring a federal judge's order not to remove her from the state, and instead putting her on a plane the next morning and flying her to Louisiana. Um, and then, like you said, six weeks of being in a for-profit prison with some of the most inhumane conditions that we can think of. Um, and that, you know, people have died, just seven people alone have died this year in for-profit prisons while in ICE detention. I mean, and that says something about how awful uh these places are and how poorly they are run and the lack of standards involved, um, and how much money is being made off of detaining people who have no criminal convictions, who have done nothing wrong, and who are you know working through the immigration system to get their um ability to stay here in the United States. So yeah, the forum shopping that's happening is one thing, but part of it is also an intention to specifically break people down in these terrible conditions so that they are begging and pleading to be deported. Um and the other angle is keeping people far away from their legal resources, like from their attorneys and from their family and friends. I had to go down to Louisiana several times to see her. Um, and it was incredibly difficult and an expensive process. There's no direct flights, it's a long drive, it's out in the middle of the nowhere. The facility itself is difficult to find and get to. So it's basically setting up the system so that people will fail and want to leave the US.

SPEAKER_01 12:43

All right. So where is uh Romase's uh case at this point?

SPEAKER_02 12:50

So um we had that bail hearing, which was, I think, one of the most interesting court hearings that I've ever seen, and many people have told me the same, where there was an incredibly lopsided presentation of evidence. There was our side presenting all of Romesa's uh you know positive factors and all of the people who love her so much and support her and talk about how what a contribution she provides to the campus, where the government presented no evidence and didn't even cross-examine her. And the judge clearly found that she was eligible for bail, that she was not a danger to the community, that she was not a flight risk, that she was a studious student who just wanted to get back to her PhD. Um, and so she was released. She's back in Massachusetts and restarting her PhD and hopefully, you know, wanting to finish on time if she can. Um, and her federal court case is just moving along where we're waiting for her habeas uh hearing, and we have actually submitted a request for a preliminary injunction related to her student status. You may have been following or even covered the thousands of students, uh, international students in the US whose CEVIS statuses, uh, you know, their student status was essentially terminated unilaterally by ICE, just despite no evidence to be to or authority to even do that. Um, and so we're seeking a preliminary injunction that her student status be reinstated or restored so that she can continue to fully engage in Tufts. Her immigration court case is um pending. She has a hearing scheduled for October at the Boston Immigration Court.

SPEAKER_01 14:36

All right. Uh I mean maybe I haven't been following this close enough, okay. So Rumesa's uh visa is currently suspended, or what's the word you're calling it?

SPEAKER_02 14:47

Yeah, so her student status is suspended. So status, your immigration status in the US is not dependent upon what we call a visa or a visa foil in your passport. The visa foil or the sticker that you get in your passport from a US embassy is basically just the travel document. It allows you to board a plane, you present the visa in your passport, you come to the US. But a person's visa could expire, and their status uh to remain in the US, their immigration status can still continue to be valid. So you'll have students like Rumesa who get a visa, come to the US, they're here studying, and then their visa might expire in their passport, but that doesn't impact their legal status. Here, what the government did was go into the CVS system and just terminate all of their student statuses.

SPEAKER_01 15:39

Okay, so so how how widespread is this? You're not saying this is his happen to all CVIS holders, or are you saying that?

SPEAKER_02 15:46

Yeah, no. So we had, I think the estimates are there were over 5,000 students that had their CVS uh student status terminated, and most of them were for um you know non-political ideological issues. But there were probably, I think, about two handfuls. We don't know, maybe even more. Um Rubio himself claimed that maybe there were hundreds of people who had their visas terminated because of their um political ideology.

SPEAKER_01 16:21

Okay, now I'm starting with Rumes' uh case is the micro. We're gonna get to the macro because there are a lot of victims of uh of this behavior by the government. Uh in that regard, uh what do you think of Rumace's uh prospects of avoiding deportation at the end?

SPEAKER_02 16:40

Yeah, I think her prospects are really strong. That the the Secretary of State had no basis to terminate her visa. In fact, in one of the three memos that we have seen, that um essentially they're saying that, well, she doesn't have she, there's nothing that we can charge her with in terms of foreign policy grounds or criminal-related matters. Like we have nothing on her. But instead, you could go ahead and terminate her visa based on your own discretion and just push the button and visa revoke her visa, and you don't need any basis for it. And we're basically arguing that that's unconstitutional and that her visa should be restored.

SPEAKER_01 17:22

All right, now let's talk about uh these jail conditions and people dying. Can you give some more details on uh both of those? Uh at least in these uh what are you calling the for-profit prisons?

SPEAKER_02 17:35

Yeah, there are a number of for-profit prisons. The one that Rumesa was uh detained in was called the Geo Group. And there are a number of others, and there are many for-profit prisons throughout Louisiana and Texas. I don't have any of the statistics at hand here, but I believe it's like anywhere around six over 60,000 individuals detained in these for-profit prisons. And they're living in incredibly inhumane uh conditions with lack of food, uh lack of safety, lack of medical care, uh, lack of fresh air and getting outside, solitary confinement, you being used as a form of um punishment for again, essentially Rumesa and um the others like her were political prisoners, right, detained just because of their political ideology. Um and there have been a number of reports. In fact, there were there was a visit uh by Senate and House uh elected officials to visit the facility that Rumesa was in and the one that Mahmoud Khalil was in in Agena, Louisiana, uh, to see for themselves. And a report was published related to the inhumane conditions in these facilities. And I'm happy to send you the link later if you want to keep that for your um share that with your with your folks.

SPEAKER_01 19:00

Yeah, so you so you mentioned Mahmoud Khalil. So how many of the uh other people in similar situations to Rameza are still being detained while the government is federal government is trying to deport them?

SPEAKER_02 19:12

Yeah, at this point I'm only aware of two, um, at least of the high-profile cases, Mahmoud Khalil and a young um Palestinian woman named uh Laka Cordia. Uh Dr. Suri has been released. Um, Mohsem Madawi's been released. There was um a young Bangladeshi man detained in Minnesota who's been released. Um, so yeah, there's still a few more, unfortunately.

SPEAKER_01 19:38

And for all these people who have been released, have they been unconditionally released, not having uh GPS monitors or other uh limitations?

SPEAKER_02 19:46

Correct. Yeah, so no monitoring, despite actually ICE trying to do that to Romesa, despite the judge's order that there be no monitoring, they were threatening not to allow her to leave the facility unless she got an ankle monitor. We refused uh and communicated with the court, and the court, the judge went ahead and issued a new minute order uh uh reminding I said he had stated that there were to be no monitoring of any form.

SPEAKER_01 20:18

Is there any litigation going on or on the horizon to improve these uh crazy prison conditions?

SPEAKER_02 20:25

You know, I think the I know the ACLU of Louisiana uh has been focused on this issue for quite some time. Uh related to litigation, I'm unaware right now of any efforts, but um I would hope that member, you know, members of Congress would try to deal with this from their um angle of as a legislative branch and maybe also from uh litigation aspect.

SPEAKER_01 20:48

I mean, I think what you're saying makes sense. This must must be intentional by the by the executive branch to uh to have these terrible conditions because the federal government has uh has plenty of money to uh to do the opposite, to have the the them be humane conditions.

SPEAKER_02 21:04

Yeah, I mean, the amount of money that the government is spending on transporting people across state lines and putting them in into these prisons, right? I mean, they could instead be uh finding more cost-effective means of monitoring individuals who they feel have, you know, who are a flight risk. But that's the thing, Jonathan, right? This isn't really an issue of who is a danger or who is a flight risk, right? The the whole point of this is the cruelty in treating people terribly in our immigration systems so that they don't want to come here, or if they're here, that they are begging to to leave. And it's a money-making process for all of these for-profit prisons and the people that invest in them.

SPEAKER_01 21:46

Okay, so let's go to the let's go to the macro then. How widespread is are are are there uh is the situation of the federal government moving to uh deport people for their uh for their political views? Uh actual are claimed and uh it sounds to me like uh Rumesa has a dream team of lawyers uh what what are the other people going to be able to do to be able to get lawyers to defend them to to defend them and to defend them well and if they don't have money and if it's parts of the country for instance where you don't have high concentrations of uh of of great immigration lawyers like where you are uh what what can be done for the uh uh for these lawyers who don't have much experience to to get up to speed uh preferably not by doing it themselves but by butting at least butting up with uh people to help get them up to speed yeah I'd love to break down what you asked into the different categories so as you said there's a category of people being detained um and being put into deportation proceedings for their for their political beliefs right for their ideological on an ideological basis um and that's a much smaller number than the basically the desperate attempts of the Trump administration to deport as many people as possible and what they're doing right now in going into immigration court uh terminating deportation proceedings just so that they can pick somebody up and subject them to what's called expedited removal.

SPEAKER_02 23:16

Okay I'm not sure if that's a term that you've heard um but unfortunately it's something that the Trump administration is um using much more aggressively where they've now defined they've basically cut out the rights of an individual to have an immigration court hearing and say that if you enter the United States at any time in the last two years and it doesn't matter where you are in the country, you could be right in the middle of you know USA you don't have to be near a border and we're gonna subject you to expedited removal or expedited deportation. We're not gonna have let you have a hearing in front of an immigration judge and we're just gonna send you back not only to where you came from but potentially a third country that you're you have no connection to no ties to nothing. So we see it's a two-pronged approach in both attacking people's legal rights to immigration court hearings and subjecting them to mass deportations and we have the individuals being targeted for their political ideology and attempts to um you know deny them green cards or refuse them visas. You may have heard that Secretary Rubio announced a new policy where there was going to be social media screening and vetting to review people's um posts. And if they I I I guess I don't know what step two is going to be oh well if we don't like your opinions on climate change or if we don't like your opinions and posts on reproductive rights or your posts on Palestine, we're not going to give you a visa. And that's what what's ironic is just today the State Department actually issued a statement indicating that they weren't going to give visas to um certain uh individuals or sorry yeah they weren't going to give visas to certain individuals abroad if they happen to try to silence the free speech of Americans and here we are having our own Secretary of state refusing to give visas to people if he doesn't like what they have to say.

SPEAKER_01 25:12

Exactly okay so the the categories of people then non-US citizens that the uh U.S.

SPEAKER_02 25:18

government is uh especially focusing on deporting is the people for their political views people with uh criminal convictions or or suspected criminals and uh and and who who else is the uh focus on right now beyond just yeah I mean I just don't look the way we like and uh and and you're not a US and you're not here with a with a visa we're gonna just move to deport you yeah I mean sadly yes basically that's it um because again it's all about politics it's about like trying to um appeal to his base right saying I made a pledge to have mass deportations claiming that they were criminals but in reality the system is you know the the data is showing that the vast majority of immigrants don't have any criminal convictions so instead they have to find other ways to try to deport people okay so what kind of numbers do we have of uh people who are being uh targets uh current and potential targets for deportation efforts for their political views and are there enough uh good lawyers to go around to defend them and are there enough financial resources for them yeah I mean and that's the problem no unfortunately there aren't enough resources because it's so difficult um it's so time consuming to have to fight the government um that you know we just don't have enough attorneys who are available who have experience and who are available to represent these individuals and most of these individuals that um are being targeted for their political opinions are students and they just don't have the resources to pay you know tens of thousands of dollars to a team of 20 lawyers who represent them. Now thank God we have the ACLU and they've stepped up and are engaging on this front and we're hoping that these few cases that are you know the high profile cases will set an example for what other lawyers can do on a smaller scale level because we don't know when the next round of targeted you know deportations for political ideology are going to take place. But there's really great resources in terms of some of the bar associations like National Lawyers Guild, National Immigration Project, National Immigration Litigation Alliance. So there are a number of smaller groups that are coming together providing resources and training to lawyers on filing habeas petitions in federal court so that people can't just be disappeared off the streets and sent, you know, not only to Texas or Louisiana but to El Salvador or I think Libya and was it Sudan or South Sudan that they were trying to send some people to just the other day. So we really need the American public to stand up and say this is wrong. And we we need the legislature which is supposed to be a co-equal branch of our government to step up and and advocate for upholding our constitutional rights.

SPEAKER_01 28:20

Okay so on that basis then let's start with what can uh what can people do for standing up and saying this is wrong? Where can they send their money to and uh we're not going to expect things from the republic the the Republicans in in the Congress but but what can the uh non-republicans in Congress be doing and and what are they doing?

SPEAKER_02 28:40

I I frankly I think that we should be demanding that our Republican leadership do the right thing for the American public right I mean the the farm the farmers um the processing plants and all of these plays that are in red states they are suffering already and they're going to suffer more when they don't have individuals who can come to work and they should be demanding that their Republican leadership stand up for um a fair just immigration system and and the American Chamber of Commerce you know says the same thing. So hopefully they'll come to their senses and not be swayed by a minority of loud, angry um unreasonable voices. But um and and the Democratic leadership I mean thankfully a lot of them are doing the right thing they are documenting all of these abuses um within the prison system within the immigration for profit prison system uh they're trying to talk I think to their Republican counterparts um probably behind back doors um and so I mean I hope those efforts continue what can we as average Americans do I think there's a there's a few there's a few things one definitely call your alma maters and ask them to stand up for free speech no matter what it is about you can't cle you can't claim that advocating for Palestinian children is anti-Semitism. It is not of course we all want to make sure that our Jewish brothers and sisters are safe on campuses in their workplaces but advocating for uh against the genocide advocating for Palestinians um self-determination for stopping the starvation of the Palestinian people it does not equate to anti-Semitism and I know so many of my Jewish colleagues and friends who are saying this loud and publicly and I stand by them because this is so important. Ultimately this happened under the Biden administration right this undermining of free speech on campuses was allowed under the Biden administration and the Trump administration has used that wedge within the Democratic Party within the progressive movement right to keep us divided to um undermine the the the the to the continue to undermine free speech. So we need to make sure that we speak out for free speech no matter what the topic is and then we need to um obviously talk to our company to like our work our colleagues at work to the companies that we work for and also ask them to stand up for free speech and for DEI frankly right because again DEI has been weaponized as something bad. And we know that that's not true for so many reasons. And so we have to be basically we have to be bold and we have to be unafraid and it is difficult to find courage in times like this and that's exactly what the Trump administration wants right they're trying to create a culture of fear especially amongst lawyers amongst the judiciary right big firms he's targeting them but look we're winning in the courts Wilmer Hale just won in federal court right um we're winning our cases in federal court Perkins Coe, these other firms right everyone people who are finally standing up against you know being bullied are succeeding in the courts because we have to do our job right we can't just expect the judiciary to to uphold our laws if we're not suing on it. So it is a difficult thing to speak up in times like this when we're afraid um I've had a number of friends reach out to me saying like oh my God I'm so proud of you thank you for standing up and speaking out it's so dangerous. You know I'm afraid to say something uh is what they tell me and I said like like look you're a lawyer you can't be afraid you need to stand up because if you as a lawyer are afraid what does that say for the average American?

SPEAKER_01 32:31

I wish it was a second nature for everybody like it is for me to stand up for anyone's First Amendment and constitutional rights regardless of their opinions. I've I've represented people's First Amendment rights all over the political spectrum. I mean when I'm called about someone whose uh views different than mine on the Middle East or anywhere else or religiously I say you know so what? As long as we can uh get along as attorney incline I'm gonna defend their rights. I certainly didn't go to federal court with the uh Westboro Baptist Church in favor of their views against uh gay people it did take until they went to the U.S.

SPEAKER_02 33:07

Supreme Court to vindicate their First Amendment rights but it's it's second nature for me and um you know it it needs to be second nature for everybody and like you said totally you people can't be saying to you yeah it's great that you have the courage everyone has to have the courage and uh you know it's it's like I say about criminal defense lawyers for instance if we criminal defense lawyers don't hang together surely we will hang the more that we together uh the the the more that we can get advances now I think that uh I was wondering if one good model here for helping uh lawyers who aren't as experienced in uh uh fighting deportations or or uh or fighting for people's first amendment rights if one good model might be uh what started as the Foundation for individual rights and education now is called the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression what they did is uh they they created a series of books three to four books to teach students how to stand up for themselves uh I think there are some organizations doing that even some I think it was that legal aid organization that I had interviewed uh Ophelia Calderon about in in in Virginia just about uh things as simple as asserting your Fifth Amendment right to remain silent making sure that uh you are getting legal assistance making sure that uh if if you are gosh forbid uh locked up that your family has a plan for how they're going to keep on uh paying the rent if you're not working uh but but is there anything of that sort that is specifically focused on helping the people who are being targeted for deportation efforts for their political views and their political actions yeah there is thanks for asking about that I mean there's a several networks of lawyers and and um nonprofit organizations that have put together resources for students that are you know scholars or anyone on a visa that's being targeted for their um you know ideological viewpoints uh there are organizations like Muslim advocates CUNY Clear as I mentioned um National Immigration Project uh ACLU and others have put together different types of know your rights documents whether it's um dealing with CBP, customs and border protection when you're returning to the US after international travel whether it's if you're already in the United States and you're worried about um being picked up by ICE because you were doxxed by one of those shadow you know pro-Israel organizations like Canary Mission or Betar or these others that have kind of outed these students and supposedly sent their names to the State Department and to the White House in terms of being targeted to be picked up and deported. So there are some really great resources like that. And then part of it also is what you said that's so important is that we know our rights and we and we exercise them, right? Like we shouldn't freely give up our phone to CBP upon entry to the US unless they really have a reason to search it and give them our password. Now they might ultimately end up taking it anyway but you don't need to give up your rights and give it to them or like you said your Fifth Amendment rights. You don't have to explain to ICE who you are or what your immigration status is. I do a lot of know your rights for like the rest for restaurant business. Unfortunately a lot of their workers are out of status and trying to go through the process of getting their immigration papers in order but it takes a long time and in the meantime they could be targeted and picked up. So explaining to them what are your rights, how do you handle a situation where ICE approaches you but the problem again then that that last layer is we can't count on the government to do the right thing. They are smashing car windows right to try to to take someone into custody when they don't even have an arrest warrant. And so what can we do about an administration that is basically a lawless that's acting like it's the wild, wild west when you know they don't even treat um criminals suspected of murder that way. So here they are picking picking up innocent people in cars and oftentimes it's turned out to be the wrong person. So I'm really worried about you know making sure that the public documents these instances and reports them and that we file complaints for um these aggressive ICE tactics.

SPEAKER_01 37:36

Okay where should these uh complaints be filed and what format should they be should they take?

SPEAKER_02 37:41

Yeah there are a number of different um forms to do that um there is an uh a government agency that the Trump administration is attempting to disband called the Civil Rights and Civil Liberties Office within Department of Homeland Security. So any civil rights violations that take place by a DHS employee whether they're immigration related or non-immigration related this um entity would take the complaints and investigate whether or not there were civil rights and civil liberties violations um there's actually currently a lawsuit in um underway I think it was it's by an organization called Project I'll have to look up the name I can't remember right now where they're litigating the dismantling of this federal agency. I believe we can still submit CRCL complaints because it hasn't fully been disbanded yet. And then you can look into um letting your local civil rights organizations know and um you know trying to figure out based on where the action is taking place and which agency it is.

SPEAKER_01 38:50

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 38:52

Where can people uh donate money to uh help make sure that there's sufficient legal assistance for the uh people who are uh targeted for uh their their political views and put into uh deportation uh proceedings yeah so um there's a several um specific legal defense fundraisers so for example for roomesa asterk's case we have a legal defense fund uh that is on a website called chuft.org chuffed mahmoud khalil and mohsa madawi also have uh fundraising uh accounts on that website um in terms of legal like organizations or nonprofits of course we have the ACLU um we also have smaller litigation based organizations like in Massachusetts we have NILA the National Immigration Litigation Alliance for example we have the American Immigration Council um that engages in litigation on a national scale and they do incredible work um so I would say look at AIC National Immigration Litigation Alliance um and I could probably send you a couple of others uh in case you post these on your website or something like that.

SPEAKER_01 40:10

And then like I said thecheft.org where Rumesa's um fundraiser is yes I I I want to do that and okay so in addition to uh just raising our voices with the uh with complaints with our elected officials uh giving money what else can uh regular folks who aren't lawyers do uh tell tell about the people who are the uh the the the the victims of deportation efforts for people's political activities or political views yeah there are some local organizations like in Massachusetts and I think they're they have nationwide uh branches called Luce L-U-C E and by the way the other organization I looked it up really quick is called Project um citizen um actually yeah yeah I'll I'll send you the link um but Luce is um at least we have a Massachusetts based one it's an immigration immigrant justice network of Massachusetts is our branch where they train individuals on how to watch for ICE.

SPEAKER_02 41:12

They have a hotline where um train volunteers um can man and volunteer for these hotlines um if you see something happening like ice trying to smash somebody's car window in to take them in, you know, record it so they teach you how to handle different situations like this. And then they actually go with individuals to immigration court to help make sure that they get there safely that they leave safely so there are a number of different organizations like Luce that do this kind of work.

SPEAKER_01 41:41

So uh we're reading especially this week about people leaving immigration court and being picked up and then about high school students not being targets uh two things on that one then can you talk about that?

SPEAKER_02 41:54

And uh do we really have this uh situation where maybe the the uh uh the Trump administration's uh uh plan is really to do the shock and awe that uh with the left hand they're violating rights and while everyone's looking at the left hand more rights are being violated with the right hand of the executive absolutely and Steve Bannon talks about this shock and awe who talks about this Steve Bannon oh yeah absolutely I mean that's the thing and here they are like cutting Medicaid funding for most Americans while at the same time they're talking about um you know deporting all of these people so yeah they're that's their that's the whole plan right is all this lawlessness um and forcing people to sue them to follow the rules and in the meantime you know their own staff and government appointed employees are making millions of dollars when there are these fluctuations in the stock market and selling stock and you know we don't hear anything about that. I think there was a recent news report about Pam Bondi for example having made millions of dollars and selling some stocks or something like that in between the tariffs on and off. So there are there are lots of shady things happening um unfortunately.

SPEAKER_01 43:12

Before uh Trump re-entered the White House how common was it uh for there to be pretrial detention uh where there were deportation efforts uh against someone who was here with a uh with a lawful visa yeah I mean I had never in my 25 years of practicing ever seen someone put into deportation proceedings um because their visa was revoked.

SPEAKER_02 43:37

And in fact I've never seen someone have their visa revoked for no reason but for like one of the few specific provisions that were available to revoke someone's visa if they were in the United States and usually was for something like a DUI or something like that. So not only did we never have students and others have their visas revoked without a basis And then we've never seen being people being put into deportation proceedings for merely having a visa revoked. And so, like Romesa, her visa was revoked with no basis. And on the basis of the visa revocation, they put her into deportation proceedings and detained her when she had committed no crime, you know, had been accused of no crime. And so it's a it's a very um, I have a hard time finding the words to describe how ridiculous and egregious the violations are uh right now in terms of government actions that have no basis in the law.

SPEAKER_01 44:42

Before Rumesa came to you for assistance, how much of your uh legal practice dealt with uh uh helping people uh with their First Amendment rights to or who are being targeted for their political actions and views?

SPEAKER_02 44:58

Yeah, so I mean I would have to say that it really only bumped up significantly in the last year or so with all of the student protests related to Palestine. So before that, I saw it very rarely. But you know, even under the Biden administration, we were worried about students being targeted by their universities, right? Being sanctioned academically, which would then impact their student status. Um, and then we were worried about students being being suspended and how that would impact their student status. But we would never expect it that it was the government that was going to terminate their student status, right? We were worried about schools like Columbia that were not protecting their students instead, actively targeting their students. Um, and then now it's it's I mean, I would say that of course the major concern is the um administration targeting these students, but we do still see some universities that are not supporting their international students and their free speech.

SPEAKER_01 45:59

What type of um uh human hours had to have had to be put into uh defending Rumace and with how many people? Because I'm just trying, I'm trying to wonder where the gap is between the the high quality work that's been done for her and that might be missing with a lot of the other similar targets.

SPEAKER_02 46:18

I think you're absolutely right. Unfortunately, there is, you know, it is missing because not only we don't even hear about some of these students, right? We don't hear about some of these people being targeted for their ideological opinions. They just don't happen to know someone in a network to tap into legal resources. But in terms of Romesa's case alone, we have at least 20 lawyers working on her case. We were essentially working on her case 24-7 at some times, right? Because filing in federal court and getting that done as quickly as possible because she's been detained in these inhumane situations. Um, we wanted to try to get her out as soon as possible. That was our priority. And we um worked on an expedited schedule, and thankfully the courts recognized the seriousness of what was happening, and they also acted in an expeditious manner and reviewing our briefings and having hearings and making a decision, except for Mahmoud Khalil's case, unfortunately. His continues to somehow languish um for reasons that I don't understand.

SPEAKER_01 47:20

So when you mentioned 20 uh lawyers, what what is your role there? Are you the lead lawyer?

SPEAKER_02 47:26

So I would uh I'm like the little central cog in this wheel somehow, um, in terms of um like I'm I'm her main attorney in terms of her coming to me for things that she needs and advice and and understanding all of her legal proceedings. Um, and you know, I'm I'm on both her immigration team, legal team and the federal court um team, but the ACLU, they are the experts on the free speech issues. And I'm so thankful that I get to work with them and their expertise in federal court, not only in Massachusetts, you know, federal court, then we were in Vermont federal court, then we were at the Second Circuit. Um, and so you know they are the um specialists when it comes to that area.

SPEAKER_01 48:15

Which law or lawyers argued in federal court on that day that led to the order to release Rumesa from uh incarceration?

SPEAKER_02 48:24

Uh so it was a team um who worked on the bail hearing from with um Jesse Rossman from ACLU Massachusetts. Uh we had Noor from ACLU National, and I'm forgetting the third person now. Oh my goodness. Um Cutie Clear, uh, who did the um the questioning of um Romesa for her bail portion?

SPEAKER_01 48:58

When you have a uh a case as major as this, how do you uh still make the time to serve all your other clients? Do you have other lawyers at your law firm to help you out, for instance, with this?

SPEAKER_02 49:09

Yeah, it's definitely a juggling act. Um, I have an amazing team of staff who work with me and just help take care of all of my regular cases. And yeah, it was pretty much 80 hours a week uh for a number of weeks now.

SPEAKER_01 49:25

The name of this program is Beat the Prosecution. Do you have any suggestions for criminal defense lawyers, immigration laws on the correct side, civil liberties lawyers, criminal defendants, the uh the the immigrants who need help for how to beat the what it's called, the prosecution to persuade, to fight on the side of right, other than anything you've talked about, and other than working around the clock when you need to, for instance.

SPEAKER_02 49:50

Yeah, I mean, tap into the networks because there are so many networks out there of people wanting to volunteer and help that night that I rushed to file her habeas petition, Rumesa's habeas petition, I didn't do it alone. I had a lot of lawyers who have a lot of experience in habeas, um in dealing with local prisons, in dealing with ICE, um, who helped me. So don't ever feel like you are doing this alone as one attorney. Tap into your resources and your networks, whether it's a local immigration bar, your American Immigration Lawyers Association chapter, whether it's a National Lawyers Guild, whether it might be like a prison, um like a prison network project or that sort of thing, and and work together because it really takes a team effort to fight these cases.

SPEAKER_01 50:42

You know, that's a good point. And as much as I have my own points of departure from the National Laura's Guild, where uh you know they're they're not so broad based about uh helping out people who are not progressives, for instance, and with the ACLU, uh, you know, the FIRE Found Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression uh wouldn't be getting so much donations if the ACLU hadn't stuck more to its core uh for the First Amendment. Uh this is certainly a situation where the National Laws Guild does shine in uh in representing immigrants' rights. Uh for the immigrants, they do help out, and the ACLU is certainly shining here. You know, the ACLU lost plenty of members in the 1970s when they represented the right uh of American Nazis uh to march in a predominantly Jewish neighborhood in Skokie, Illinois. The ACLU was right on the money there, they were totally principled there, and principles are just so important here, and it's so important for lawyers. You know, I mean I'm talking the you know the choir here, uh lawyers and everyone else to be willing to lose some uh current profits and maybe learn lose some current friends to uh to do the right thing. Look at the look at the law firms, for instance, who are probably beating their heads against the wall, who have kowed out to Trump, and then see all the other law firms who are winning against his onslaught on lawyers.

SPEAKER_02 52:06

Yeah, I mean, and that's the thing. People don't stand up for their principles, right? What kind of lawyer are you if you're basically bowing down to an authoritarian who is targeting you because you were just offending your clients, right? Um, so nobody wants a law law firm like that. And sadly, I don't know why they didn't realize that and they capitulated uh and signed these ridiculous agreements. And we saw the same thing with the universities, right? Targeting students for free speech and throwing them under the bus. So I think that goes to history is not going to look kindly upon those organizations and those universities.

SPEAKER_01 52:43

And this has also been an opportunity for Tufts to shine because even 10, 20 years ago, Tufts did not have a good reputation for supporting free expression. But uh I emailed the president right after I saw that the president of Tufts had insisted to the federal government to release uh Rumeasa. I mean, this this is an opportunity for Tufts to turn a new leaf on free expression in general, not just in supporting uh their students who are going up against the Trump administration.

SPEAKER_02 53:12

Yeah, thank you for drawing attention to that. Absolutely. Tufts has been um uh a leader when it comes to now standing up for their students and ensuring that Romesa, at least, right, is getting um her fair day in court. Um and I hope that they set an example that that other universities see the example that Tufts is setting um in in standing up for free speech for their international students.

SPEAKER_01 53:38

And did Tufts uh or and or its president stand up for Romeus's rights without hesitation, or did they have to be nudged or cajoled?

SPEAKER_02 53:46

No, they they did it without hesitation. It was it's been a pleasure to work with them.

SPEAKER_01 53:52

So uh now you said that there was that the federal government presented no evidence uh uh uh about uh what what Romeus had specifically done. Uh am I correct that uh there was one piece of evidence that they want to call that, which was just the article that she co-authored?

SPEAKER_02 54:10

Yeah, um, so actually we submitted that into federal court evidence um because it was a document that was submitted into her immigration court hearing. Um it was one of three memos, and I forgot to circle back to that. The Washington Post reported about those other two memos, one of them that appears to be the smoking gun that says that, yeah, we have nothing against her. Um, so instead, let's use our discretionary authority to terminate her visa and try to deport her. Um and so there have been a number of really great publications, like Vanity Fair actually just came out with a great piece by one of their reporters, Christiane Farias, who talked exactly about this lopsided hearing where everything presented was glowing reviews of Romesa and her contributions to the community, um, and nothing presented by the government. They didn't even allude to that one page, what often some people have referred to as a Soviet-style looking letter that alludes to certain misgiving, misdoings, but actually presented no evidence at all of any um untoward or criminal behavior at all.

SPEAKER_01 55:22

So is the Trump administration spending much time on deciding who its targets are for seeking deportation of people for their political views or activities, or is it more like they're saying, okay, this person is uh is just uh going against the grain of what we want, so we're gonna target this particular person? Or is it more a slapdash that uh you know uh people send in uh articles? Maybe someone sent in Romesa's article to the to uh Rubio and said, Hey, something has to be done. Do you have any idea about just how chaotic or planned uh this craziness is?

SPEAKER_02 55:57

I think that's a million-dollar question that we're all asking ourselves, and we're leaning on that. This is total sloppy work, um, without any research being done into who is actually engaging in anything that we should be current concerned about as Americans. Um and yeah, it's it's really, I mean, I think well, you you called it like slapdash, just like, hey, let's do this, let's try that, let's see what happens, what kind of chaos we cause. And it doesn't matter if we break rules along the way. Uh, let for let's force people to sue us to stop it.

SPEAKER_01 56:31

There are so many other things that I would like to talk to you about, but I told you we went at five, ended five, we're just about there. I want to give you an opportunity not only to say anything that you haven't said already, but I didn't even give you an opportunity to give your URLs. So please let people know where to find you. Uh, I have to imagine your phone's been ringing off the hook so much you may have had to hire people to run a switchboard.

SPEAKER_02 56:54

Yeah, it's thank you. Yeah, it's been very, very busy. Um, yeah, you can find me on LinkedIn by just searching my name, Masa Kanbabi. Um, but my website address is www.mkhymmigration.com. So my initials mk hyphen immigration.com. Um, and I guess, you know, the only thing that I want to encourage your listeners to remember and think about is that, you know, immigrants, we I mean America is is made up of immigrants. We are an immigrant nation. Um, and it doesn't matter if your family came here centuries ago, if your family came here two years ago, if your family came here 50 years ago, right? These are our community members, our family members are our colleagues. Um, they're the people that care for our parents, um, care for us in the hospital, they prepare our foods, um, you know, they come up with incredible innovations uh to make our lives better. And we shouldn't fall for the vilification of immigrants and this false narrative of them being criminals and how the media portrays them and how the administration portrays them. So please, you know, remember that and remember that these are your neighbors and your friends and your family and stand up for their rights.

SPEAKER_01 58:08

Absolutely. And my hope here, MASA, is that uh the people who heard what you just said are not just the members of the choir, and fortunately, I think uh other people beyond that are listening too. And I just want to make them members of the choir as well.

SPEAKER_02 58:23

Yeah, thank you for all of the important work you do. It's it's incredibly um informative, and I do hope that more people listen and take up action.

SPEAKER_01 58:33

One thing I'm gonna say before I sign off is I was standing at the doorway of my uh this the kitchen to my suite when I read your email accepting my invitation to come on the show. Now, at first I was disappointed that Rumesa wouldn't be there, but she's got to look after herself first. And I shouted out and I literally jumped up, shout out, yes, and uh I startled my paralegal and her glee about what I was so excited about. And the importance of this is that we need to just keep making the noise. We need to be fighting in the courts, we need to be fighting in the uh court of public opinion, we need to be uh self-aware ourselves. We could go on and on. So I will just say, Masa Khanbabi, thank you so much for joining us. Everyone listening, this is not just the end of it, this is the start of your standing up for what's right and continuing it, not just in this area, but everywhere with civil liberties. This is John Katz. I'm a lawyer in Northern Virginia doing criminal defense and DY defense work. The name of this show is Beat the Prosecution because there is no other choice. Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_00 59:44

Thank you for listening to this week's episode from Beat the Prosecution. This is a regular podcast giving people a leg up against police investigations and prosecutions. Nothing discussed on our media sources, such as our podcast or website, is legal advice. John Katz only provides legal advice to current clients or to individuals who have paid for a consultation. We welcome you contacting us via email at info at beatheprosecution.com by calling our office at 703 383 1100 or texting us at 571 406 7268.