ICE detains Harvard researcher from Russia who protested Ukraine war | Hacker News Reader

ICE detains Harvard researcher from Russia who protested Ukraine war

washingtonpost.com

98 pointsperihelions15 comments

Though I deplore detention and deportation for immigration violations, it’s worth mentioning in this case that this poor woman was asked to bring some biological samples back from France by her adviser and didn’t declare them. That’s not in the headline.

There is no suggestion in the article that she is being detained for her opposition to the Ukraine war.

She probably doesn’t have a great case. The culpable party here is 1000% her adviser who asked her to bring the samples back given “the complications [her adviser] Peshkin has experienced when French colleagues try to mail him research samples.” (Ok so you aren’t supposed to bring such material here…)

It’s unconscionable and incredibly stupid to put a foreign student at risk by asking for such a “favor”, which she surely didn’t feel in a position to refuse. He shouldn’t even have asked an American (who can’t be deported) to do such a thing!

There's a right way to ship it and in personal baggage isn't it.

What’s kinda fucked up here is that like, if we all know this then what the point is deportation proceedings?

A/B testing revealed this headline gets more clicks than "who tried to import undeclared biological samples".

However the fact that she did protest the war means that she has a potential political asylum case.

We should not pretend there might be anything normal about her treatment, which now includes 6 weeks of imprisonment so far:

From the article: "The usual consequence of such a customs violation is forfeiture of the identified item, a fine of up to $500 or both"

"the officers had 'no legal basis' for revoking her J1 visa over this violation."

>It’s unconscionable and incredibly stupid to put a foreign student at risk by asking for such a “favor”, which she surely didn’t feel in a position to refuse. He shouldn’t even have asked an American (who can’t be deported) to do such a thing!

Typical academia behavior to treat your reports as disposable.

It may also be a misunderstanding about how strict customs can be in the US compared to many EU countries.

I have been to airports in the US where customs routinely x-rays all bags, and dogs are common. Passengers are often directly asked coming in whether they have anything to declare and expected to answer honestly.

I've almost never had any inspection by customs entering into an EU country. People routinely don't declare things, and at times I've seen the majority of passengers on flights coming in from outside the EU go through the blue internal-EU lane for customs, with no repercussions or checks. In fact, I don't think I've ever seen someone declaring something, unlike the US.

On at least one occasion, I wanted to declare something coming into an EU country (value above exemption, not something dangerous), and simply couldn't. There were no customs officials at all. Some airports have a phone number or phone, or at least some information, at the red items-to-declare lane for this situation, but this one didn't. It appeared that, despite have having a very low exemption amount that was not marginal (a value of €exemption+€1 pays tax and duties on €exemption+€1, exemption-€1 pays nothing, ridiculously), they simply didn't expect to have anyone declare anything.

This is a pretty important story and deserves a lot more upvotes than it’s getting.

Unrelated (I hope): FBI has also searched the home of an Indiana University computer security researcher, Xiaofeng Wang. His colleagues don’t know where he is. The University has scrubbed all of his web presence. https://bsky.app/profile/matthewdgreen.bsky.social/post/3llj...

Well, they forgot to scrub this page: https://alliance.iu.edu/members/member/8580.html

Someone else has archived it, just in case: https://archive.is/UyV3P

ICE ≠ CBP. Importation of forbidden materials is handled by CBP, not ICE.

I mean, ICE is literally immigration and customs.

Somewhat bizarrely, it appears that they at least partially correct. US Immigration and Customs Enforcement [1] and US Customs and Border Protection [2] are somehow two completely separate agencies, both under the Department of Homeland Security. My understanding is that CBP handles customs at airports, so it may be they initially detained her, but then apparently may have transferred her to ICE?

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._Immigration_and_Customs_E...

[2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._Customs_and_Border_Protec...

If only someone were tasked with streamlining the government!

https://archive.ph/2025.03.29-160435/https://www.washingtonp...

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