It’s also crazy (read: unconstitutional) to punish students who do have everything to do with these protests.
Now, the Trump admin is not this careful, and many people who are not overt HAMAS supporters have probably been affected. But I wish to make the point that there is a substantial group of students (non-citizen HAMAS supporters) for whom punishment is not crazy.
You’re allowed to be a Nazi, you’re allowed to be a Hamas (non-financial) supporter, you’re allowed to be a pro-Gaza genocide advocate if you want. You can advocate for the extermination or enslavement of all black or white or Christian or atheist or gay people if you want.
You may (and probably should) become a social pariah and private parties can decline to affiliate with you, but the government isn’t allowed to do a damn thing about it.
The question is: To whom do these rights extend in the U.S.?
They certainly don't extend to foreigners at the border (any country would rightly turn away an avowed Al-Qaeda member). Foreigners in the U.S. are in the U.S. at the pleasure of the government.
Do foreigners currently in the U.S. have these rights? I don't know for sure, maybe it's not a settled issue. My guess is that the U.S. gov't asks "Are you a terrorist?" at the border for good reasons, and one reason is so they can kick you out for lying to them when they learn you're a HAMAS supporter.
Should they have these rights? I'm honestly not sure of my feeling on this. Perhaps the way to handle it is to prevent the renewal of a visa or re-entry, but not actually kick anyone out for it.
The country obviously has no obligation to give visas to anyone. However, once you are within US jurisdiction (i.e. in the country), you have a suite of Constitutional rights including (unambiguously) 1st Amendment and 5th Amendment rights. So, correct, they definitely cannot be deported without due process. They cannot be deported even with due process for protected speech. They cannot even lose their visas for protected speech. There are a million different reasons the government may decline to give someone a visa or they may revoke one, but "engaging in protected speech" is not one of them.
And yes, yelling "kill all X" during a protest is protected speech in this country, which AFAIK is far beyond what any of these people are alleged to have done.
"It is well established that noncitizens have at least some First Amendment rights," wrote Judge William G. Young of the U.S. District of Massachusetts. "Although case law defining the scope of noncitizens' First Amendment rights is notably sparse, the Plaintiffs have at least plausibly alleged that noncitizens, including lawful permanent residents, are being targeted specifically for exercising their right to political speech."
So it seems less than clear.
From: https://reason.com/2025/05/02/immigrants-and-radicals-have-t...
sorcerer-ma’s comment made it sound like we are speaking of Mahmoud Khalil and others.
I am under the impression that the settled law is that 1A applies to everyone physically present in the country.
A little reading leads me to believe:
- 1A limits what congress may do, "Congress shall make no law...". It does not positively define what people may do, and therefore doesn't pick out a class of people to whom it applies.
- It is settled that the U.S. government may condition immigration-related decisions on your speech and actions. They don't have to let in an Al-Qaeda member when he shows up at the border, and they don't have to give a pro-HAMAS agitator in the country on a temporary visa a green card. It's still not totally clear to me if a green card might have some sort of special-but-noncitizen status, and maybe it's not clear in general.
- The U.S. government asks people who are applying for entry or a visa questions like, "Are you a terrorist, or have you ever belonged to or supported terrorist organizations?". Part of the reason they do this is to catch you in a lie if it then turns out that you are e.g. supporting HAMAS. If you lied on your immigration documents, they can throw you out.
- For this reason, it seems like e.g. refusing to renew a visa on the grounds of HAMAS support would be fine. But maybe canceling a visa and kicking someone out wouldn't be fine?