Know your rights: Protesting and traveling in the U.S. as a noncitizen
Post Reports
The Washington Post
4.4 • 5.1K Ratings
🗓️ 1 April 2025
⏱️ 26 minutes
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Summary
From New York to Boston to Washington, we've seen arrests of noncitizens by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, citing ties to Hamas and Hezbollah. The evidence seems to be their participation in protests of the Israel-Gaza war, or social media posts.
Civil liberties groups say the legal justifications are tenuous and potentially unconstitutional. The First Amendment protects the right to speak, protest and publish views, regardless of citizenship status. But experts say that deportation is an area where courts have historically granted the executive branch broad latitude — and that gray area is where the Trump administration is operating.
Today on “Post Reports,” reporter María Luisa Paúl joins host Colby Itkowitz to outline the rights of noncitizen protesters.
And, as reports emerge of travelers being questioned, detained or refused entry at U.S. ports of entry — and of travelers having their phones searched and taken by border patrol officers – technology reporter Heather Kelly shares her guide to locking down your devices.
Today’s show was produced by Rennie Svirnovskiy. It was mixed by Sean Carter, and edited by Maggie Penman.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | In New York last month, ICE detained a green card holder who got his master's at Columbia University. |
| 0:08.5 | His wife, who's American, recorded video of the arrest. |
| 0:11.8 | Turn around, turn around, turn around. |
| 0:14.1 | Okay, let's not. |
| 0:15.6 | Okay, okay, he's not resisting. |
| 0:17.2 | He's giving me his phone, okay? |
| 0:18.9 | He's not, I understand, he's not resisting. He's giving me his phone, okay? He's not... I understand. He's not resisting. |
| 0:21.6 | Like... |
| 0:22.6 | In Boston last week, masked officers in plain clothes detained a Tufts University student from Turkey. |
| 0:31.6 | You may have seen this video. |
| 0:33.6 | These people surround her in the street. She panics and screams. |
| 0:53.3 | Both were in the country legally, and both are now facing possible deportation, seemingly for their political speech supporting pro-Palestinian campus protests. Their cases are part of a sweeping |
| 0:55.1 | Trump administration crackdown on foreign nationals. Here's Secretary of State, Marker Rubio, |
| 1:00.3 | talking about this effort, which the administration said has already led to more than 300 visas |
| 1:05.9 | being revoked. Every time I find one of these lunatics, I take away their visa. |
| 1:09.6 | You're saying it could be more than 300 pieces. |
| 1:11.6 | Sure. |
| 1:12.6 | I hope. |
| 1:13.6 | I mean, at some point I hope we run out because we've gotten rid of all of them. |
| 1:16.6 | But we're looking every day. |
| 1:22.6 | From the newsroom of the Washington Post, this is Post reports. |
| 1:26.6 | I'm Colby Echowitz. It's Tuesday, April 1st. |
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