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AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org. I’m Amy Goodman.
We begin today’s show looking at growing demands for the release of Leqaa Kordia. She’s a 33-year-old Palestinian woman who’s been in ICE detention for nearly a year. She was arrested during the 2024 Gaza solidarity protests at Columbia University, but the charges were later dropped. Then, last March, Kordia was detained at an ICE check-in in Newark, New Jersey. Federal immigration officers said her student visa had expired. She’s been jailed at ICE’s Prairieland Detention Facility in North Texas since. She’s the only person who remains in detention from the Columbia Gaza solidarity mobilizations.
Leqaa Kordia recently suffered a seizure in the ICE jail. She was hospitalized for three days, with her family and legal team desperately searching for her, while ICE refused to share information about her whereabouts. In a statement released by her legal team, Leqaa Kordia said her hands and legs were shackled the entire time she was hospitalized, including when she went to the bathroom. “I felt like an animal,” she said.
Leqaa writes in the statement, quote, “The hospital told me I was more prone to seizures because of poor sleep, inadequate nutrition, and stress. The doctor advised me to reduce my stress and eat food to avoid a future seizure. I don’t know how I can do that while I’m confined,” she said. She went on, “At Prairieland, your daily life — whether you can have access to the food or medicine you need or even a good night’s sleep — is controlled by the private, for-profit business that runs this facility.” She said, “We live in filthy conditions. The best medicine for me and everyone else here is our freedom.”
She concluded, “The only reason ICE targeted me in the first place is because I protested against the Israeli government’s genocide in Gaza. Even now, U.S.-made bombs continue to destroy Palestinian homes and kill Palestinian families.” Those were the words of Leqaa Kordia.
In December, NPR’s Radio Diaries aired part of a phone call between Kordia and her cousin Hamzah Abushaban, who has been in touch with her regularly throughout her detention.
LEQAA KORDIA: I received a call from my mother telling me, “There are people asking for you from the government.” At the beginning, I felt like they’re missing a form or something. OK, I’m just going to solve this issue, and then, like, I’ll have my green card soon. But they took my — my fingerprints and all that. They said, “You’re going to Texas.” I said, “Texas? Like, that’s really far away.” And when I arrived to Texas, the place was overcrowded.
HAMZAH ABUSHABAN: How many people are there with you?
LEQAA KORDIA: So, right now we’re 87, and the capacity of this place is 37. It’s a lot of people sleeping on the floor.”
HAMZAH ABUSHABAN: Woah.
LEQAA KORDIA: Yeah. Maybe another word to describe this place: a big bathroom. It’s open. Everything is open. There is no privacy.
AMY GOODMAN: The Department of Homeland Security has refused to release Leqaa Kordia on bond despite multiple court orders. Last week, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani wrote, quote, online, “Leqaa Kordia has spent nearly a year in an ICE prison for exercising her First Amendment rights in NYC & speaking out against the ongoing genocide in Palestine. She was hospitalized after suffering a seizure. Now she’s back in detention. This is cruel & unnecessary. Release Leqaa now,” Mayor Mamdani wrote.
For more, we’re joined by Sarah Sherman-Stokes, Leqaa Kordia’s immigration attorney. She’s associate director and clinical associate professor at the Boston University School of Law.
Sarah, thanks so much for being with us. Leqaa Kordia has been in prison for almost a year, has been in an ICE jail. Tell us about the circumstances, about her being hospitalized, about you and the family not being able to find her when she was first hospitalized. Please give us the details.
SARAH SHERMAN–STOKES: Thank you so much for having me, and thank you for those questions.
Leqaa Kordia is a young woman. She is a daughter. She is a sister. She is a cousin. She is a devout woman of faith. Her faith is very important to her. She’s a proud Palestinian woman. Hearing her voice at the top of the hour and again now, I’m reminded also what an advocate she is. And so, I think it’s important to start with that.
Despite that, unfortunately, on Friday, February 7th, Leqaa had a seizure. This was on the heels of being sick of months of malnutrition and poor conditions at the Prairieland Detention Center. She had a seizure. She was taken to the hospital. The family was alerted by someone who had been formerly detained at Prairieland. The women inside, they look out for each other. And Leqaa is no exception. She is constantly advocating for the other women inside. But Leqaa was rushed to the hospital, and for 72 hours we did not know where she was. The legal team and her family put in repeated calls and emails to ICE. We were ignored. The emails went unanswered.
Ultimately, ICE told us that it would be a safety issue if they were to reveal either her condition or her whereabouts, which was sort of a bewildering statement, because shortly thereafter, ICE revealed to a reporter where Leqaa was being kept, or where she was hospitalized. And we only found out where she was through that reporter.
But through it all, we had no idea whether she was — frankly, whether she was alive or dead. This has been the deadliest time for people in ICE detention. Since President Trump took office for a second time, 36 people have died in ICE custody, and we were worried that Leqaa would be 37.
AMY GOODMAN: This is her first seizure, the one that she had in jail?
SARAH SHERMAN–STOKES: That’s correct. This is the first seizure she’s ever had in her life. In fact, she’s been a relatively healthy person physically until she was detained by ICE nearly a year ago. In ICE custody, unsurprisingly, her health has deteriorated significantly. She’s lost weight. She’s been unable to eat. Her repeated requests for halal food have been denied. She’s forced to live on snacks from the commissary, which depends on her family providing her basically a weekly allowance so that she can supplement her calories, because the food that they provide at the facility is inedible and also doesn’t conform to her dietary needs. So, she has been really unwell, as have many other women in that detention facility.
AMY GOODMAN: Let’s go back to hear more of Leqaa Kordia in her own words. In this excerpt from NPR’s Radio Diaries, she talked about the charges she faces and how ICE has appealed her release.
LEQAA KORDIA: The charges were only about immigration. So, if it’s only about immigration, I’m fine, I’m going to be out very soon. The judge ruled that I should be released, and ICE appealed the same day, saying that I’m dangerous, I went for a protest and all that. The second time, the judge ruled immediate release again, and again ICE appealed the same day. It’s just like — like a slap on the face, because I came to America looking for freedom and freedom of speech, freedom of everything. You know what I mean? To be held here in this place for saying “Free Palestine, ceasefire now,” that was like kind of a shock to me, because that’s not the America that I heard of.
AMY GOODMAN: So, that’s Leqaa Kordia in her own words. Again, in The New York Times, a judge twice ruling she’s not a threat to the U.S. and could be released on a $20,000 bond. You told The New York Times government lawyers have twice filed a rarely used provision known as an automatic stay, which keeps a person detained during the appeals process. So, what can get Leqaa out?
SARAH SHERMAN–STOKES: Yeah, that’s a great question. So, Leqaa has been — as you said, Leqaa has been ordered released twice by the immigration judge. The government has all but completely abandoned any argument that she is a danger to persons or property. And the judge found that any risk of flight would be ameliorated by a $20,000 bond. Her family has been ready and willing and able to pay that bond. And as you mentioned, the government has twice invoked this automatic stay provision to keep her detained while we appeal.
Her legal team recently filed a status request in — a request for a status conference in federal court, so that we can get her case again in front of a different judge and again argue for her release. Leqaa should never have been detained, and she certainly should not be detained nearly one year later, especially not following this seizure. Her health is at great risk if she remains in custody.
AMY GOODMAN: And can you explain on what grounds the government is holding her? Tricia McLaughlin, spokesperson for DHS, said Ms. Kordia has been “found to be providing financial support to individuals living in nations hostile to the U.S.”?
SARAH SHERMAN–STOKES: So, yes, the Department of Homeland Security in this case has argued that sending remittances to beloved family members is somehow a danger or against the law. There is no law that forbids people in the United States from sending remittances, sending what little money they’ve saved up to their beloved family members abroad. Tens of thousands of immigrants do this every day across the United States, and Leqaa is no different.
She’s lost more than 200 members of her family to the genocide in Gaza, and what little money she was able to save working as a waitress in Paterson, New Jersey, she sent to family members whose houses and businesses had been bombed by the Israeli military. She did what all of us would do to support our family members who are struggling. And the government has tried to weaponize that and use it against her, but they’ve been unsuccessful. The immigration judge saw right through that argument and ordered her release on bail, notwithstanding that argument by the government.
AMY GOODMAN: Where could the Trump administration deport her to, Sarah Sherman-Stokes?
SARAH SHERMAN–STOKES: So, the government has argued that she should be removed to Israel. The judge found that she would be persecuted in Israel, and actually granted her something called withholding of removal, saying that it would not be safe for her to be sent back to Israel, because it is more likely than not that she would be persecuted there. The government is now appealing that ruling, and so the litigation continues on the merits of her case.
AMY GOODMAN: Has Columbia weighed in, even if she wasn’t a student there?
SARAH SHERMAN–STOKES: To my knowledge, Columbia has not weighed in. I, on one level, find that unsurprising. They haven’t weighed in to support or defend, you know, any, or at least not many, of the folks that have been arrested at the protests and mobilizations there. Leqaa is like so many others, like Mahmoud Khalil, like Rümeysa Öztürk, like many others who have spoken out for Palestine, who have called for an end to the genocide, who have called for a ceasefire. She’s exercising her constitutionally protected free speech rights. But, no, I don’t see Columbia standing up to support her.
AMY GOODMAN: Finally, where exactly is she being held now?
SARAH SHERMAN–STOKES: She remains back at the Prairieland Detention Center in Alvarado, Texas, where she is being held with hundreds of other people, including the women in her sort of dorm or bunk area, many of whom have ongoing and chronic health conditions just like her. And as she said in her press release in her own words, this story isn’t just about her. This story is about the many other women and men and people who are also confined in ICE custody and whose stories aren’t being told. They, too, should be free.
AMY GOODMAN: Sarah Sherman-Stokes, I want to thank you for being with us. She is the immigration lawyer for Leqaa Kordia, associate director and clinical associate professor at the Boston University School of Law.
Coming up, the Oscar-nominated Alabama Solution, a stunning new documentary taking viewers inside what’s been described as “America’s deadliest prison system,” based on footage secretly recorded on cellphones by prisoners locked up in Alabama. We’ll speak with the film’s directors and a lawyer in Alabama who represents some of the men featured in The Alabama Solution. Stay with us.
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AMY GOODMAN: “Pavan Guru” by Sonny Singh in our Democracy Now! studio. On Monday, February 23rd, Democracy Now! will be celebrating our 30th anniversary at the historic Riverside Church here in New York. Sonny Singh will be playing at the reception. And those in the program are Angela Davis, Naomi Klein, the Nobel laureate Maria Ressa, the singer-songwriter Michael Stipe, jazz legend Wynton Marsalis, the Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Mosab Abu Toha and more. See democracynow.org for more information.
