Dallas, TX. Yesterday, Leqaa Kordia filed an updated petition in her federal lawsuit seeking her immediate release from the Prairieland Detention Facility in Alvarado, Texas, where U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has been confining her unlawfully since March 14, 2025. Ms. Kordia is a 32-year-old Palestinian Muslim from New Jersey whom the administration targeted, immediately after Mahmoud Khalil, to punish her for protesting against Israeli military violence that has now killed nearly 200 members of her own family in Palestine and over 60,000 other Palestinians. 

Ms. Kordia’s updated petition incorporates new evidence unearthed in AAUP v. Rubio. The evidence shows that the administration’s policy of targeting, investigating, surveilling, arresting, confining, and seeking the deportation of noncitizens who have expressed support for Palestinians extends to anyone involved in protests on or near campuses, irrespective of affiliation with a campus or immigration status. This new evidence makes clear that Ms. Kordia’s targeting is part and parcel of the same, suppressive policy the administration has weaponized against so many others, including Mahmoud Khalil, Rümeysa Öztürk, and Mohsen Mahdawi, whose release federal courts have compelled under the First Amendment. 

At every step of the way, ICE has thwarted Ms. Kordia’s efforts to seek liberty, and, as a result, she has now spent five months in immigration confinement. This confinement has prevented her from participating in peaceful demonstrations denouncing the ever escalating military violence and forced starvation that are devastating her people. Now, cruelly prevented from joining protests, she is still doing what she can to continue speaking out for Palestinian lives and dignity. You can read her poignant views here. 

Ms. Kordia is represented in her federal lawsuit by the Texas Civil Rights Project (TCRP), Muslim Advocates (MA), the CLEAR Project, and Waters Kraus Paul & Siegel (WKPS) and in her immigration removal proceedings by the Boston University School of Law Immigrants’ Rights Clinic. 

Press inquiries can be directed to: 

TCRP: [email protected] 

MA: [email protected]

CLEAR: [email protected]