On April 11, an immigration judge in Louisiana ruled that Mahmoud Khalil, a former Columbia University graduate student and lawful United States permanent resident, can be deported. Not for committing a crime. Not for violating immigration rules. But for his political speech – specifically for helping organise a peaceful Gaza solidarity encampment at his university.

The government’s case against Khalil is hinged on Section 237(a)(4)(C)(i) of the Immigration and Nationality Act, a Cold War-era provision that permits the deportation of any noncitizen whose presence is deemed a potential threat to US foreign policy. The evidence the government submitted against him was a two-page memo from Secretary of State Marco Rubio, asserting – without proof – that Khalil’s “beliefs and associations” could “adversely affect U.S. foreign policy interests”. Ironically, the document itself admitted that Khalil’s actions were “otherwise lawful”.

And yet, it was enough. The mere invocation of “foreign policy” or “national security” now operates like a legal incantation, overriding First Amendment protections, due process and even common sense.

Khalil’s case is not an outlier. It is the leading edge of a broader strategy to silence dissent in the US – particularly dissent critical of Israeli policies or sympathetic to Palestinian rights – using various legal tools. This use and abuse of the US legal system sets a dangerous precedent that in the long run will harm American democracy.

Dozens of international students and scholars – many from Muslim-majority countries or racialised communities – have also been subjected to surveillance, detention and deportation, often without any allegations of criminal wrongdoing.

Among them is Badar Khan Suri, a visiting academic at Georgetown University and Indian citizen who was arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) at his home in Virginia and later transferred to Texas. He remains in detention, facing removal based on his family ties. The father of his American wife used to work as an adviser to the Gaza government.

Another example is Rumeysa Ozturk, a Turkish Fulbright scholar and doctoral student at Tufts University who was detained after co-authoring a newspaper opinion piece related to the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement. A US immigration judge has since denied her release, labelling her a “flight risk and a danger to the community”.

Another recent case is that of Mohsen Mahdawi, a Palestinian green card holder and Columbia student protest leader who was arrested by ICE agents when he went for his US citizenship interview. He now faces deportation to the occupied West Bank, which he said would be “a death sentence”, given that he has lost family and friends to Israeli military violence.

Then there’s Momodou Taal, a British-Gambian PhD candidate at Cornell University who filed a lawsuit against President Donald Trump’s administration, arguing that executive orders targeting pro-Palestinian activists violated his First and Fifth Amendment rights. Despite suing preemptively and being legally represented, Taal’s efforts were ultimately undermined by jurisdictional manoeuvring and executive pressure. His emergency injunction was denied by a federal judge on March 27, and days later, he self-deported, saying he no longer trusted the courts to protect him even with a favourable ruling.

There is also Yunseo Chung, a South Korean-born Columbia student and US permanent resident who narrowly avoided deportation thanks to a preemptive federal court injunction. Alireza Doroudi, an Iranian engineering PhD student at the University of Alabama, was quietly detained with no explanation. Ranjani Srinivasan, an Indian student at Columbia, fled to Canada after ICE agents visited her apartment. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) later released footage of her departure, labelling her a “terrorist sympathiser”.

In this campaign of political persecution, the Trump administration has largely relied on immigration courts, which are not part of the independent federal judiciary under Article III of the US Constitution.

They are administrative tribunals housed within the executive branch, specifically, the Department of Justice. Their judges are appointed by the attorney general, lack tenure and are subject to political oversight. The procedural protections available in Article III courts – such as full evidentiary hearings, impartial review and constitutional due process – are substantially weakened in immigration courts.

While federal courts may scrutinise whether an arrest or deportation violates constitutional protections – like the First Amendment or equal protection – immigration judges are often empowered to rule based on vague assertions of “foreign policy concerns” or “national security interests” with little to no requirement for concrete evidence. This dual-track legal system allows the government to bypass the constitution while maintaining the appearance of legality.

There have been numerous calls to reform this system from legal scholars, human rights organisations and even former immigration judges. Proposals have included moving immigration courts out of the Department of Justice and into an independent Article I court structure to ensure judicial impartiality.

However, these reforms have consistently failed, largely due to congressional inaction as well as political resistance from successive administrations that have benefitted from the system’s malleability. The executive branch has long viewed immigration courts as a tool of policy enforcement rather than neutral adjudication.

While this crackdown has so far focused on noncitizens with legal status, it could soon extend to naturalised Americans. US law allows the revocation of citizenship in cases of fraud, membership in terrorist organisations and other crimes. In his first term, Trump created a dedicated “Denaturalization Section” within the Department of Justice to pursue citizenship revocations. About 700,000 immigrant files were investigated with the aim of bringing 1,600 cases to court.

Trump has now signalled that he intends to pick up his denaturalisation drive where he left off. If he deploys this legal tool against critical voices, this would mean that even citizenship may no longer offer protection if one’s political views fall out of favour with the government.

As the Department of Justice, DHS and ICE have worked together on the campaign against dissent, they have received public support from nonprofit organisations. Groups like Betar and Canary Mission have taken public credit for identifying international students involved in pro-Palestinian activism and urging their deportation.

Betar claims to have compiled a list of foreigners it labelled as “jihadis” and submitted it to the Trump administration. Canary Mission, meanwhile, launched a project called “Uncovering Foreign Nationals”, which publishes the names and photos of international students it accuses of anti-Semitism or anti-Israel activism – effectively creating a blacklist.

While there is no official confirmation that DHS or ICE have acted directly on these materials, the close timing between these campaigns and government enforcement has raised serious concerns that these politically motivated private groups are shaping federal immigration enforcement without transparency or accountability.

The US portrays itself as a beacon of liberty, a nation governed by the rule of law, where freedom of speech is sacred. But Khalil’s case – and the others like it – paint a starkly different picture. If your residency, citizenship, education or even physical freedom can be revoked for peacefully expressing political views, then speech is no longer a right. It is a conditional privilege.

This is more than a legal overreach. It is a moral crisis for American democracy. When free speech becomes contingent on political loyalty and when private blacklists shape federal enforcement, the foundational values of liberty, pluralism and equality before the law are being dismantled.

What American democracy urgently needs is congressional action to establish judicial independence in immigration courts, stronger First Amendment protections for noncitizens and full transparency around the government’s reliance on private ideological actors. Anything less risks enshrining a two-tiered system of rights and, ultimately, a country where dissent itself is deportable.

This is not just a test of immigration policy. It is a test of democracy – and of the very soul of the nation itself.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.