Wisconsin Palestinian community leader can be deported, immigration judge rules

What Happened

On Wednesday, US immigration judge Jayme Salinardi ruled that Salah Sarsour, a Palestinian community leader in Milwaukee and board member of American Muslims for Palestine (AMP), can be deported. His lawyer Patrick Taurel said he will appeal, and a federal judge's order prevents Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) from re-detaining Sarsour for now. Sarsour, a US green card holder for 32 years, was arrested in March on national security grounds; his legal team says the arrest was because of his speech in support of Palestinian rights. The judge, a former ICE chief counsel, announced her retirement from the bench the same day, which Sarsour's lawyers called 'odd'. Taurel said the record shows Sarsour was not convicted of throwing a Molotov cocktail or of supporting a terrorist organization. Pro-Israeli groups have claimed AMP is a front for Hamas, but AMP, a registered non-profit that lobbies Congress, denies any such link.

Key Actors

Why It Matters

The ruling extends a pattern of the Trump administration using a previously dormant immigration provision to target Palestinian activists and green card holders, raising due process and free speech concerns. It intersects with the Israel-Palestine conflict because Sarsour's advocacy and AMP's alleged links to Hamas are central to the government's case, and Sarsour frames the deportation as an attempt to silence Palestinian narratives amid the Gaza war, where the article cites 74,000 Palestinian deaths, a figure The Lancet calls a severe undercount.

Watch For

Monitor Taurel's appeal and any change to the federal judge's order that currently bars ICE re-detention. A separate trial on the destination country is expected next year, with Taurel arguing that deportation to the occupied West Bank requires Israeli permission and would risk Sarsour's life after alleged past torture by Shin Bet. Also watch whether the Democratic senators' bill to repeal Section 237(a)(4)(C) gains traction, and the outcomes of parallel cases involving Mahmoud Khalil, Mohsen Mahdawi, and Badar Khan Suri.