BS BULLETIN:
- A federal judge has ruled that the Trump administration cannot use two immigration provisions to revoke visas or pursue deportation of lawfully present noncitizens merely because of constitutionally protected speech supporting Palestinians, criticizing Israel or expressing views officials regard as sympathetic to Hamas.
- The ruling directly challenges Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s crackdown on foreign students after he declared that if it becomes clear someone thinks “Hamas is a good group,” the government should revoke that person’s visa.
- The distinction matters: the case concerns protected speech and association, not violence or actual material support for a terrorist organization.
The Trump administration says foreign students who come to America and cheer on Hamas shouldn’t count on keeping their visas.
A federal judge says the First Amendment has something to say about that.
U.S. District Judge Noël Wise ruled Friday that provisions of federal immigration law used by the administration against lawfully present noncitizens are unconstitutional when they are enforced on the basis of protected speech.
The case was brought by The Stanford Daily and an international student identified as Jane Doe, who argued that the administration’s immigration crackdown was causing foreign students to censor themselves rather than risk losing their visas or being deported.
Wise sided with them.
“Stated plainly, in the United States, freedom of speech belongs to the people,” she wrote. “It is not the government’s to take.”
But buried in the lengthy ruling is the political collision that makes this considerably more interesting.
The administration began scrutinizing foreign students following the explosion of anti-Israel demonstrations on American college campuses.
An ICE Homeland Security Investigations team examined thousands of names, looking in part for students “supporting terrorist organizations.”
And Secretary of State Marco Rubio wasn’t exactly coy about what he intended to do.
Asked in April 2025 about the government’s standard, Rubio said that if someone comes to America and “it becomes obvious you think Hamas is a good group,” then “we should revoke your visa.”
Rubio went further.
“When someone is presented to me and it’s clear that this person is a supporter of a foreign terrorist organization, we’re going to remove them from the country,” he said.
“You’re not going to be here; it’s just that simple.”
Apparently it isn’t quite that simple.
The court found that the government’s approach swept protected political expression into its definition of terrorist “support.”
According to the ruling, investigators considered everything from statements supporting terrorist leaders all the way to actual material assistance such as money.
But here’s the critical distinction.
The court specifically noted that the cases underlying this challenge did not rely on acts of violence or material support for terrorist groups.
Instead, authorities cited things including protest attendance, associations with pro-Palestinian groups, social media posts and op-eds.
Wise concluded that the government cannot turn lawful political speech into grounds for deportation simply because officials consider the viewpoint harmful to American foreign policy.
“Our Constitutional right to freedom of speech guarantees people the right to express” opinions that may be repugnant or run against prevailing political norms, Wise wrote.
She also warned about where such government power could eventually lead.
“Tomorrow, or perhaps even today, targets may include anyone in the United States who exercises their freedom of speech to simply express opinions the government does not like.”
The ruling declared the challenged portions of the deportation and visa-revocation provisions unconstitutional as applied to protected speech under the First Amendment and unconstitutionally vague under the Fifth Amendment.
The case is particularly significant because FIRE, which represented the challengers, says it is the first federal decision to squarely rule on the constitutionality of these provisions and could affect other immigration cases involving pro-Palestinian activists.
So no, the ruling doesn’t hand foreign nationals a constitutional Get Out of Deportation Free card for materially assisting Hamas.
But it does tell the Trump administration there is a line between supporting terrorists and saying things about terrorists that the government finds repulsive.
And that line is called the First Amendment.
DBS WIRE SOURCES
- Twitchy — Judge Rules Trump Admin Cannot Deport Noncitizens for Supporting Terrorist Organizations
- Associated Press — Trump cannot deport students for criticizing Israel, judge rules
- Courthouse News Service — Judge rules Trump admin cannot punish noncitizens for protected speech
- FIRE — Federal court rules the statutes the Trump admin used in its speech-based deportation scheme are unconstitutional
- Justia — Stanford Daily Publishing Corporation et al v. Rubio et al — Memorandum of Decision
