North -American Senator Elizabeth Warren asks federal officials to publish any documentation that supports the basis of the continued arrest of the Tufts doctoral student Rümeysa Özturkwho was arrested in Somerville last month.
Özturk, a 30 -year -old Turkish national, was detained as he walked to an Iftar, lunch in the evening to break a Ramadan Fast on March 25. He has never been charged with a crime, but federal officials have accused him of supporting Hamas, a foreign terrorist organization designated in the United States.
The only basis for the indictment seems to be a co-author of Op-Ed Özturk in the Tufts student newspaper who criticizes the university for his response to a series of resolutions that the Senate study condemns the ongoing conflict in Gaza.
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Cite A report at Washington PostWarren said that a statement from the State Department did not find any evidence showing Özturk “dedicated to anti -Semitic activities or made public statements that supported a terrorist organization.”
This note has not been published publicly.
“The Memorandum seems, therefore, contradicts the public justification of the federal government to revoke the visa of Ms. Öztürk,” Warren wrote a la carte, sewn by Sen Ed Markey, D-Mass., And the American representative Ayanna Pressley, D-7th District for Massachusetts. “The case of Mrs. Öztürk demands transparency. The circumstances of her arrest and detention come up with serious concerns about civilian freedom, academic freedom and free expression, as well as the veracity of the Trump administration.”
The letter calls for Secretary of State Marco Rubio to provide Warren, Markey and Pressley a copy of the Memorandum referred to in the Washington Post report on April 30.
The legislators also asked Rubio to provide any other document in possession of the Department on the “basis for the revocation of visas of Ms. Öztürk and how it was identified for this action.”
This is the second time that Warren and other Democratic legislators have publicly pressured officials for more information on the case of Özturk.
In A letter from March 28 Signed by more than two dozens of senators and members of the United States, Warren wrote: “The reason for this arrest seems to be the expression of this student of his political opinions.”
Öztürk has been detained in Louisiana for almost a month since his arrest, as he fights his arrest in a federal court. A Vermont judge takes into account if he has the authority to take on his case.
In the meantime, a judge of the Immigration Court in Louisiana denied his request for a link, keeping it in arrest.