On March 8, the Trump administration escalated its attack on free speech and protests by detaining a lawful resident for his role in Columbia University’s campus protests for Palestinian rights, saying that it was the “first arrest of many to come.” Sojourners spoke to seminaries, divinity schools, and Christian colleges and universities to try and understand how schools are defending international students amid the crackdown.
At Union Theological Seminary, which has a nearly 100-year partnership with Columbia, students and administrators said they were trying to make sense of actions that encroached on rights to free speech. Prince Acquah, who came to Union from Ghana and is on track to graduate in 2025, told Sojourners that after two months of President Donald Trump’s second term, he no longer recognizes America.
“I don’t know how safe it is for me,” Acquah, co-chair of the International Students Caucus and the Student Senate at Union, said. “It really has thrown me off a little. I don’t know if the word is ‘scared,’ but I have been very conscious of how I engage in my environment and surroundings.”
The arrest of Mahmoud Khalil
Acquah’s shifting sense of safety comes after Immigration and Customs Enforcement detained Mahmoud Khalil, a 2024 graduate from Columbia University in New York City, from his home in a Columbia-owned building, according to The Columbia Spectator.
Khalil has not been charged with a crime, and according to the conservative outlet The Free Press, White House officials were blunt that the arrest was not based on any illegal activity. The unnamed source described Khalil as a “threat to the foreign policy and national security interests of the United States.
“The allegation here is not that he was breaking the law,” the official told The Free Press.
The Spectator reported that Khalil’s lawyers and his wife, who is 8 months pregnant, were not told where he was being held until Monday morning, when they learned the government had transferred him from New York to Louisiana.
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On Wednesday, Khalil’s lawyers said in court that they requested a private meeting with Khalil and were scheduled a meeting for March 20, more than a week later.
According to the progressive outlet Zeteo, Khalil had recently appealed to Columbia for support from the harassment he was receiving and his fear of detainment from ICE.
“I haven’t been able to sleep, fearing that ICE or a dangerous individual might come to my home,” Khalil wrote, according to Zeteo. “I urgently need legal support, and I urge you to intervene and provide the necessary protections to prevent further harm.”
Union Theological Seminary
Frederick Davie, a senior executive vice president at Union, told Sojourners that the school had an obligation to think in advance about threats the Trump administration may pose to international students. He saw the detainment of Khalil as an attempt to create “worry and fear” for those who are here on visas or have permanent legal status through a green card.
Since the election, Davie said the school has attempted to make sure that people know their rights.
“We’ve made sure all of the people in our community know what the laws, rules, and reg[ulations] are,” he said. “We also have a very strong staff, in our student services, from the dean to our president, who offer all forms of support for all of our students, but particularly students who feel themselves under stress.”
Just before Inauguration, Union hosted a “Know Your Rights, Find Your Voice: Faith Communities Against Mass Deportation” event alongside other interfaith partners in the city. Legally, ICE and other law enforcement may not enter private spaces without permission unless they have a judicial warrant. But Davie wouldn’t say whether Union was committed to denying entry to law enforcement without judicial warrants.
“We're in constant conversations with our legal counsel about where we are in that regard,” he said. “We would expect that if there was any reason for law enforcement to come on to Union's campus — in any case other than an emergency or an invitation from us — there would be the proper legal footing and standing for doing that … That's what you expect in a democracy.”
Since 2017, Union has described itself as a “Sanctuary Seminary.” Union’s main entrance, which is the entrance for access to residential housing, classrooms, the library, and faculty and administrative offices, has a sign that reads: “All Authorities Must Produce a Judicial Warrant for Entry,” according to a photo shared with Sojourners by Helena Theis, co-chair of the International Students Caucus. When asked whether the sign meant Union had a policy of denying entry to law enforcement without judicial warrants, Afsheen Shamsi, Union’s vice president of communications and marketing, left open the possibility the school may invite law enforcement to campus in some situations.
“Union is private property and in all non-emergency situations, unless otherwise invited in, as per the law a judicial warrant is required to gain entry,” Shamsi wrote. “We have no further comment beyond this.”
Shamsi then did not reply to a question on whether there was a policy for when Union staff should invite ICE or law enforcement.
Theis, who sent Sojourners a photo of the sign, came to Union from Germany. She told Sojourners that communications from Union’s administration has “very strongly” stated that the New York Police Department and ICE were not welcome on campus without judicial warrants, “unless there’s a very serious case.”
Union and Columbia’s partnership extends beyond their degree programs. Union is financially independent, but the theology school’s Burke Library is part of the Columbia Libraries system. Additionally, Union students have access to a host of Columbia’s resources.
“When it comes to Union policies about how we will operate in our own spaces and where we are, we set those policies, not Columbia,” Davie said.
But neither Shamsi nor Davie would answer questions about who sets policies for shared spaces like the Burke Library, with Davie only saying, “At this point, Union provides security for the Burke Library.” Columbia did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Columbia’s policies allow the ICE access to nonpublic areas under “exigent circumstances,” which differs from other universities in New York City according to The Spectator.
Theis said she feels safe in the Burke Library; Acquah told Sojourners that he and other student leaders have a lot of grace for their administrators who are processing and navigating the tumult.
“[Union] has been trying to provide resources for international students, and I haven't heard a lot of complaints,” he said. “So far, the school has been very supportive in this whole dilemma … we are sending grace to administration while holding them to keeping us safe.”
Other responses
Amanda Staggenborg, vice president of communications for the Council for Christian Colleges & Universities, an association of more than 180 member institutions from largely evangelical backgrounds, said that the CCCU is regularly working to help institutions know their rights and responsibilities.
“The CCCU is working with campuses on a case-by-case basis to determine their legal rights and encourage them to secure legal counsel, when necessary, to review the specific facts of their case,” she told Sojourners in an email.
The CCCU recently endorsed a letter from the Evangelical Immigration Table, a coalition of organizations and leaders that work to “encourage distinctly biblical thinking about issues of immigration,” as well as advocate for public policy. The letter called for the Trump administration to “prioritize immigration enforcement efforts on individuals convicted of serious violent offenses or who otherwise pose a credible public safety threat, rather than utilizing limited resources to remove individuals who have resided in the United States for many years without committing any serious criminal offense, many of whom are members of local churches and have U.S. citizen minor children.”
Tom Krattenmaker, director of communications for Yale Divinity School, said the school was participating in Yale University’s broader efforts to ensure students know their rights. He said the university was organizing a webinar specifically for graduate students who may be concerned.
Rachel Goodman, counsel at the anti-authoritarian nonprofit Protect Democracy, told Sojourners that they saw the detainment as part of the administration’s strategy to suppress dissent and demonize immigrants.
“We really do think that we are at a five-alarm fire moment for free speech,” she said. “This is just one of a whole blitzkrieg of actions the administration has taken to demonstrate that it is willing to use all the tools at its disposal, and even those that ought not be at its disposal, to silence opposition and chill dissenting speech.”
She said that “the administration still has not made clear or filed anything indicating what its actual statutory basis for any of these actions are” and that they were intentionally confusing “the question of ‘material support for terrorism and a terrorist organization’ with a much broader circle of speech —support of ceasefire or Palestinians, or against U. S. policy in Israel-Gaza.”
She said that in her view, the Trump administration “intentionally picked speech that it believes is unpopular” in hopes that it would fracture the pro-democracy movement. To respond, Goodman said one of the best ways that individuals could defend freedom of speech would be to make clear that even if they disagree with Khalil’s position, it is wrong to detain him.
“It is really important to express that viewpoint to members of Congress — including in the Democratic Party,” she said. “The more solidarity, the more collective action, the more linking arms across divides of religion and viewpoints to make clear that there is a unified opposition to these kinds of actions, the better for our democracy."
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