Alvarado, Texas — Palestinian woman Who was the last person Still detained in immigration detention centers after the Trump administration’s 2025 crackdown on pro-Palestinian activity on campus, he was released Monday after a year in detention.
Liqaa Kordia, 33, is from the West Bank and has lived in New Jersey since 2016. Detained in an immigration detention center in the United States In Texas since last March. Her arrest is partly linked to her participation in a protest outside Columbia University in 2024.
“I don’t know what to say. I’m free! I’m free! Finally, after one year,” Kordia told reporters after leaving the detention center.
The immigration judge had ordered her released on bail three times. The government appealed the first two rulings, but Cordia was released Monday on $100,000 bail after not appealing the third ruling.
Cordia said she is looking forward to returning home and hugging her mother “tightly.” But she also said she would continue to fight for the people still detained at the detention center.
“There is a lot of injustice in this place,” she said. “There are a lot of people who shouldn’t be here in the first place.”
It was cordial Among a number of detainees Last year, after the Trump administration began using its immigration enforcement powers on noncitizens who criticized or protested Israeli military actions in Gaza, many students and scholars took refuge at American universities.
And he was among them Mahmoud Khalila former Columbia University graduate student who participated in campus protests. He spent three months detained in an immigration prison in Louisiana before being released. Rumisa Ozturk, a student at Tufts University who co-wrote an op-ed criticizing her university’s response to Israel and the war, He was arrested For six weeks.
Others didn’t fight to survive – A doctoral student in Colombia She fled the United States after her visa was revoked and immigration agents showed up at her university apartment.
The arrest of activists like Khalil has drawn condemnation from elected officials and human rights defenders. But Cordia was not a student or part of a group that could provide support, so her case remained largely out of the public eye while she remained in detention.
Cordia said she joined a 2024 protest outside Columbia University after Israel killed dozens of her relatives in Gaza, where she was Maintains deep personal relationships. City police arrested about 100 people at that protest, but the charges against her were dropped and closed. Information about her arrest came later Given to the Trump administration By the New York City Police Department, which said it was told the records were needed as part of a money laundering investigation.
Cordia was arrested while checking in on March 13, 2025, with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in New Jersey. She was immediately arrested and flown to the Prairieland Detention Center south of Dallas.
Federal officials accused Cordia of overstaying her visa while scrutinizing payments she sent to relatives in the Middle East. Cordia said the money was intended to help family members suffering during the war.
Tricia McLaughlin, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, had previously criticized Cordia for what she said was “providing financial support to individuals living in countries hostile to the United States.”
“The facts of this case have not changed: Meet Cordia is in the country illegally after violating the terms of her visa,” the department said in an email Monday evening.
“The Trump administration is committed to restoring the rule of law and common sense to our immigration system, and will continue to fight to arrest, detain, and deport aliens who have no right to be in this country,” the statement read.
The immigration judge found “overwhelming evidence” that Cordia was telling the truth about the payments.
Cordia was recently hospitalized For three days after an epileptic seizure after she fainted and hit her head in the special detention centre.
At a hearing Friday, Cordia’s lawyers said she suffers from a neurological condition that worsened while in detention, putting her at risk for seizures. They reiterated that she can stay with her American citizen family members and does not pose a flight risk.
Immigration Judge Tara Naslow agreed.
“I heard testimony. I saw thousands of pages of evidence presented by the defendant, and very little evidence presented by the government on any of this,” Naslow said.
New York City Mayor Zahran Mamdani said on Channel X that he had requested her release When he met President Donald Trump last month
“I am grateful that Al-Liqa was released this evening from ICE custody after more than a year in detention for his advocacy for Palestinian rights,” Mamdani said.
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Offenhartz reported from New York.