As a former assistant chief counsel with ICE, I have experienced how three different administrations have wielded immigration authority. Mahmoud Khalil’s case is different.
Not because his arrest was authorized by Secretary of State Marco Rubio finding that Khalil’s “presence or activities in the U.S. would have potentially serious adverse foreign policy effect,” but because the American people are watching.
People watched as ICE agents went inside Khalil’s home on March 8, 2025, to arrest him, at first disclosing that his visa was being revoked, only to switch the charge when they discovered that he was a lawful permanent resident. The acting field office director, William P. Joyce, even submitted a sworn affidavit stating that Khalil was arrested “in front” of the residence, only to amend it the next day to state Khalil was arrested “in the front foyer.”
These contradictions aren’t anomalies but symptoms of an agency that has been afforded the presumption of reliability for too long. In immigration proceedings, judges are instructed to believe ICE officers over non-citizens, reinforcing a system where ICE’s statements are presumed truthful, even when they contradict themselves. Meanwhile, non-citizens enter the courtroom with a presumption of guilt, forced to prove their credibility in an already biased system.
Yet Khalil is one of the lucky ones. His lawyer, Amy E. Greer, worked through the night to file an emergency request to the District Court of the Southern District of New York to stop his transfer. But even with legal intervention, Khalil disappeared into the ICE transfer machine. ICE didn’t disclose to Khalil’s lawyer, or to his pregnant wife, that he would be transferred to New Jersey and then 1,000 miles away to Louisiana.
The transfer of non-citizens from facility to facility is a policy that has been in place since at least 2012. Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.) expressed concern in August 2022 when at least 65 detainees from the county jail in Goshen, N.Y., were sent more than 1,300 miles away to Mississippi. ICE ...
