Cornell Student Momodou Taal’s Request To End His Deportation Denied By U.S. District Judge

His visa was revoked after he participated in a pro-Palestine protest.

U.S. District Judge Elizabeth Coombe refused to prevent the deportation of Momodou Taal, a British-Gambian Ph.D. student at Cornell University, whose visa was revoked after he participated in pro-Palestine protests on March 26.

According to The Associated Press, Coombe also declined to halt the enforcement of two executive orders that are largely responsible for a crackdown on international students involved in activism against the genocide of Palestinians perpetuated by the Israeli government, funded by American taxpayer dollars.

According to The New York Times, Taal argued during the hearing that he has already been made a prisoner, and as its reporting indicates, this ruling could raise the chances of a potential deportation or detention.

“This process is imminently hanging over me, and it has impacted every aspect of my life. I feel like a prisoner already, although all I have done is exercise my rights,” Taal wrote in court documents.

The federal government in general, and Donald Trump in particular, argued that the pro-Palestine demonstrations and protests were pro-terrorist, antisemitic, and anti-American.

In a post to his social media accounts on March 10, Trump wrote, “We know there are more students at Columbia and other universities across the Country who have engaged in pro-terrorist, anti-Semitic, anti-American activity. We will find, apprehend, and deport these terrorist sympathizers from our country — never to return again.”

However, according to Eliza Salamon, a Jewish 2024 graduate of Cornell who also participated in the protests, accusations of antisemitism against Taal are false.

“I’ve always seen Momodou treat everyone with the utmost respect, and I think it’s truly awful that these false accusations of antisemitism are being weaponized,” Salamon told the Times.

In court, Eric T. Lee, a lawyer representing Taal, made the case that the potential deportations of Taal and others were unconstitutional.

“There’s nothing in the Immigration and Nationality Act that makes someone deportable for attending a protest,” Lee said during a court hearing on March 25. “What we’re asking this court to do is strike down these orders. They’re plainly unconstitutional.”

Despite this argument, Coombe decided that Lee and the rest of Taal’s lawyers did not clearly establish whether she had the authority or jurisdiction to halt deportations, which are handled by immigration courts.

She also said in a ruling that Taal did not meet the high bar for the temporary restraining order he was seeking or adequately prove that his rights were under assault.

“Jurisdictional issues aside, Plaintiffs Ngũgĩ and Parasurama have not established that there is an imminent or ongoing threat to their constitutional rights that could be appropriately remedied by the requested restraints,” Coombe wrote.

“Any future harm alleged in their affidavits appears to be speculative and even moot because of the revocation of Taal’s visa,” the judge added in her ruling.

As Taal previously told The Hill, he has a much different idea of what his future harms could resemble.

“And given how they (the government) went after Mahmoud (Khalil), who has a similar fact pattern, I didn’t want to be a sitting duck for eventually myself or other international students. So, I found the lawsuit as a form of protection seeking national injunction to challenge the constitutionality of these executive orders,” Taal told the outlet.