On August 28 a federal judge in San Francisco ruled that the Trump administration violated the 4th and 5th Amendments of the U.S. Constitution by using immigration enforcement to retaliate against international students for protected speech. U.S. District Judge Noël Wise issued a 90-page ruling stating that the Trump administration violated the Constitutional rights of non-citizen students when it sought to deport them for criticizing Israel’s war in Gaza. The judge added that this is a threat to the constitutional freedoms of all people in the United States.
“In the United States, free speech, including the freedom to criticize the government and its leaders, is not a sign of our democracy’s fragility,” Judge Wise wrote. “It is evidence of its strength. That strength is diminished when members of our society—citizens and noncitizens alike—must self-censor and ‘behave’ or suffer the government’s retaliation.” The judge continued, “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. This downward spiral is antithetical to our Constitution that recognizes our right to speak freely. Here you can simultaneously hate the content of a person’s speech and love the country that cherishes the freedom to allow it. Zealous protection of our constitutional right to free speech is a provocative demonstration of our country’s powerful lack of fear.”
