Roughly 100 Georgetown University students and community members walked out of classes March 11 to protest the federal detainment of Mahmoud Khalil, a Palestinian student organizer and activist at Columbia University.
Federal immigration officers detained Khalil, a lawful U.S. permanent resident and prominent activist during pro-Palestine student protests at Columbia last spring, in his university student housing March 8. Khalil’s detainment incited concerns about violations of First Amendment rights as the Trump administration justified his detainment based on Trump’s executive order prohibiting antisemitism.
The Georgetown chapter of Faculty and Staff for Justice and Palestine (FSJP), an organization that advocates for Palestinian liberation, and Zeytoun, a group of Georgetown graduate students advocating for decolonization in southwest Asia and north Africa, organized the walkout. During the walkout, students went to Red Square and chanted “Free, free Palestine,” “ICE off our campuses” and “From Palestine to Mexico, all the laws have got to go.”
Mark Lance, a professor emeritus of philosophy and founding director of Georgetown’s Justice and Peace Studies program, spoke at the walkout and said attendees aimed to support student protesters amid Trump administration promises to deport or expel pro-Palestine college student organizers.
“We’re here today, here specifically on Georgetown’s campus in the capital of the United States, to say that we will not obey, that we will resist,” Lance said at the rally. “We will remain steadfast in our support for brave students who believe in justice.”
Khalil, a green card holder and legal U.S. resident who completed a Columbia graduate program in December, negotiated with university administrators during encampments on Columbia’s campus last spring protesting the Israel-Hamas war and demanding the university’s divestment from financial holdings affiliated with Israel. Georgetown students and community members joined similar encampments at George Washington University in April and May 2024.
Georgetown’s free speech policy provides community members the “broadest possible latitude” of opportunities for open dialogue, though it contains time, place and manner restrictions as well as discrimination and harassment policies.
A January executive order reaffirmed Trump presidential campaign promises to revamp free speech protections, though the administration revoked $400 million of federal funding from Columbia due to alleged harassment of Jewish students during last spring’s protests. The administration also pledged to revoke student visas from international students who participated in pro-Palestinian protests.
Rally attendee Fiona Naughton (SFS ’26) said Khalil’s arrest reflects the Trump administration’s efforts to scare students out of protesting.
“That’s such a visible example of a Palestinian organizer being abducted for speaking out against Columbia’s support of the Israeli apartheid regime, and I think that is a mechanism of terror,” Naughton told The Hoya. “It’s supposed to terrify student organizers, especially those who are on visas or who are in precarious financial positions, who are relying on scholarships from their universities.”
Demonstrators nationwide have staged protests in support of Khalil, with students at the University of Chicago and the University of California, Berkeley protesting in support of Khalil March 11 and hundreds of protestors marching through New York City to demand Khalil’s release the same day.
Layth Malhis (GRD ’26), a Zeytoun organizer who attended the walkout, said the Georgetown walkout displays the interconnection between student pro-Palestine protestors across college campuses.
“Palestinian students cannot be suppressed,” Malhis told The Hoya. “The walkout demonstrates that we are not isolated to the Georgetown community, to the campus itself, that what happens to our fellow comrades and our friends and families at different universities, at different institutions affects us and that we are all connected one way or another.”
Critics of the Trump administration’s choice to detain Khalil argue that the detention is a First Amendment violation targeting speech Trump deems anti-American. The U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights sent letters to 60 universities stating they would be investigated for antisemitic harassment, which provoked controversy as critics questioned whether such investigations targeted students exercising their right to protest.
Gwen Wright, a Georgetown senior auditor and former Maryland historic preservation director who attended the walkout, said university communities must maintain free speech.
“Universities are places for free thought and different ideas and different dialogues,” Wright told The Hoya. “If we shut that down in universities, it again is just a precursor to shutting it down everywhere in society.”
Walkout attendee Cal Ricehall (CAS ’27) said he hopes protests against Khalil’s detention will raise awareness of free speech rights.
“I hope that if people make enough noise, the government realizes you can’t imprison people for a speech that they deem incompatible with the United States,” Ricehall told The Hoya. “Free speech means free speech no matter what, no matter if you disagree with it. It means people get to say terrible things sometimes, and that’s your fundamental right as an American citizen.”
Khalil’s detention comes amid a broader environment of federal oversight into higher education. A February federal mandate required universities to eliminate diversity, equity and inclusion programs or risk losing federal funding, and federal grant cuts diminished research opportunities at many universities.
FJSP member Fida Adely, the director of Georgetown’s Center for Contemporary Arab Studies, said FJSP’s decision to organize the walkout centered on Khalil’s arrest and its implications for free speech.
“Although there have been students who’ve had their visas rescinded under the Biden administration, but this is the first time, at least recently — not in U.S. history but recently — in which a legal resident of the U.S. is being threatened with deportation for exercising their free speech rights,” Adely told The Hoya.
Adely added that universities must protect their students and faculty from government interference.
“We’re at a critical moment where universities are under attack and academic freedom is under attack,” Adely said. “It’s a combination of a couple of years, 17 months, of real repression of free speech around Israel and Palestine. And so this new regime, this new administration, has been really emboldened by that. Universities really need to stand up and defend their institutions, defend their students and defend academic freedom.”
Ricehall said he hopes students continue to protest infringements on their values.
“What I hope comes out of this is that students show that they’re not going to put up with ICE on their campuses,” Ricehall said. “They’re not going to put up with gross violations of their right to speak out on issues they care about, they’re not going to put up with violations of their right to protest a genocide.”
Malhis said federal attempts to suppress pro-Palestinian speech pose threats to other political speech.
“It doesn’t stop at Palestine. If they continue to suppress us, and if they’re successful in suppressing us, they’re going to come after other forms of speech,” Malhis said. “The Georgetown community should recognize that they can walk idly and not support our movement — that’s within their right — but they shouldn’t feel safe themselves, because one way or another the message of repression will be applied to other cases after Palestine. Palestine is not the end, but simply the beginning.”
Ajani Stella and Ari Citrin contributed to reporting.