VERMONT: A Palestinian student arrested during an interview about finalizing his US citizenship is helping to launch an initiative to help other immigrants facing deportation in Vermont on Thursday, a week after a federal judge freed him from custody.
Mohsen Mahdawi, 34, who led protests against Israel’s war in Gaza at Columbia University, spent 16 days in a state prison before a judge ordered him released on April 30. The Trump administration has said Mahdawi should be deported because his activism threatens its foreign policy goals, but the judge ruled that he has raised a “substantial claim” that the government arrested him to stifle speech with which it disagrees.
Immigration authorities have detained college students from around the country since the first days of the Trump administration. Many of them participated in campus protests over the Israel-Hamas war, which has killed more than 52,000 Palestinians. Mahdawi was among the first to win his freedom after challenging his arrest.
“Justice is inevitable. We will not fear anyone because our fight is a fight for love, a fight for democracy, a fight for humanity,” Mahdawi told supporters outside the courthouse last week.
He will join Vermont State Treasurer Mike Pieciak, Senate Majority Leader Kesha Ram Hinsdale and community advocates at the Statehouse to announce the Vermont Immigration Legal Defense Fund. The group, which also includes lawyers and philanthropists, says the goal is to improve access to legal advice for immigrants and build long-term infrastructure within the justice system as it pertains to immigration law.
Members of Vermont’s congressional delegation have spoken up on Mahdawi’s behalf, as have state politicians. Vermont’s House and Senate passed resolutions condemning the circumstances of his detention and advocating for his release and due process rights.
Republican Gov. Phil Scott has said there is no justification for the manner in which Mahdawi was arrested, at an immigration office in Colchester.
“Law enforcement officers in this country should not operate in the shadows or hide behind masks,” the governor said the next day. “The power of the executive branch of the federal government is immense, but it is not infinite, and it is not absolute.”
Mahdawi, a legal permanent resident, was born in a refugee camp in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and moved to the United States in 2014. At Columbia, he organized campus protests and co-founded the Palestinian Student Union with Mahmoud Khalil, another Palestinian permanent resident of the US and graduate student who was arrested in March.
His release, which is being challenged by the government, allows him to travel outside of his home state of Vermont and attend his graduation from Columbia in New York later this month.
Released Palestinian student to help launch immigrant legal aid initiative in Vermont
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Released Palestinian student to help launch immigrant legal aid initiative in Vermont
- Mohsen Mahdawi, 34, who led protests against Israel’s war in Gaza at Columbia University, spent 16 days in a state prison
- “We will not fear anyone because our fight is a fight for love, a fight for democracy, a fight for humanity,” Mahdawi told supporters
Ukraine’s Zelensky: We have backed US peace proposals to get a deal done
- “The tactic we chose is for the Americans not to think that we want to continue the war,” Zelensky told The Atlantic
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Kyiv had sought to back US peace proposals to end the war with Russia as President Donald Trump seeks to resolve the conflict before November mid-term elections.
Zelensky, in an interview published by The Atlantic on Thursday, said Kyiv was willing to hold both a presidential election and a referendum on a deal, but would not settle for an accord that was detrimental to Ukraine’s interests.
“The tactic we chose is for the Americans not to think that we want to continue the war,” Zelensky told the US-based publication. “That’s why we started supporting their proposals in any format that speeds things along.”
He said Ukraine was “not afraid of anything. Are we ready for elections? We’re ready. Are we ready for a referendum? We’re ready.”
Zelensky has sought to build good relations with Washington since an Oval Office meeting in February 2025 descended into a shouting match with Trump and US Vice President JD Vance.
But he said he had rejected a proposal, reported this week by the Financial Times, to announce the votes on February 24, the fourth anniversary of Russia’s invasion. A ceasefire and proposed US security guarantees against a future invasion had not yet been settled, he said.
“No one is clinging to power,” The Atlantic quoted him as saying. “I am ready for elections. But for that we need security, guarantees of security, a ceasefire.”
And he added: “I don’t think we should put a bad deal up for a referendum.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin has said Zelensky is not a legitimate negotiating partner because he has not faced election since coming to power in 2019.
Zelensky has said in recent weeks that a document on security guarantees for Ukraine is all but ready to be signed.
But, in his remarks, he acknowledged that details remained unresolved, including whether the US would be willing to shoot down incoming missiles over Ukraine if Russia were to violate the peace.
“This hasn’t been fixed yet,” Zelensky said. “We have raised it, and we will continue to raise these questions...We need all of this to be written out.”
