Indian researcher Badar Khan Suri freed as US court rejects alleged Hamas links

Badar Khan Suri, an Indian academic and visiting scholar at Georgetown University, has been ordered released from immigration detention by a US federal judge, who said his prolonged custody raised “serious constitutional concerns.”

Suri, a postdoctoral fellow in Washington, D.C., had been held in a Texas detention center for nearly two months after being arrested by plainclothes federal agents outside his home in Arlington, Virginia, on March 17. He was accused by the Trump administration of having ties to Hamas, the militant group designated a terrorist organization by the United States.

US District Judge Patricia Giles, ruling from Alexandria, Virginia, ordered his immediate release on Wednesday and authorized his return to his family on personal recognizance.

“Speaking out about what’s happening in Palestine is not a crime,” said Suri’s wife, Mapheze Saleh, in a statement issued by the Center for Constitutional Rights. “Let’s show the world that this country is still a place where people can and do express their beliefs without fear.”

Badar Khan Suri said he was glad to be released as he left a federal detention facility in Alvarado near Dallas alongside his attorney. Khan Suri will go home to his family in Virginia while he awaits the outcome of his petition against the Trump administration for wrongful arrest and detention in violation of the First Amendment and other constitutional rights. He’s also facing deportation proceedings in an immigration court in Texas, the Associated Press reported.

Suri, who entered the US in 2022 on a J-1 visa, is married to Saleh, a Palestinian American. Immigration authorities alleged he had “undisputed family ties” to Hamas because his father-in-law previously served in the Hamas-backed Gaza government. However, the American Civil Liberties Union argued that Suri barely knew the man and had never advocated violence.

According to Associated Press, the Trump administration has said that it revoked Khan Suri’s visa because of his social media posts and his wife’s connection to Gaza as a Palestinian American. They accused him of supporting Hamas, which the US has designated as a terrorist organization.

Suri, a former student of Jamia Millia Islamia, was teaching “Majoritarianism and Minority Rights in South Asia” and had a PhD in peace and conflict studies from India, as per the Georgetown University website.

Immigration authorities have detained college students from across the country — many of whom participated in campus protests over the Israel-Hamas war — since the first days of the Trump administration. Khan Suri is the latest to win release from custody, along with Rumeysa Ozturk, a Tufts University student from Turkey, and Mohsen Mahdawi, a Palestinian student at Columbia University.