Her crime is expressing an opinion. I am no Hamas supporter, but writing an opinion essay supporting Hamas seems like it would be allowed by the 1st amendment, regardless of the immigration status of the opinion writer.

In a statement to ABC News, a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson said: "Rumeysa Ozturk is a Turkish national and Tufts University graduate student, granted the privilege to be in this country on a visa. DHS and ICE investigations found Ozturk engaged in activities in support of Hamas, a foreign terrorist organization that relishes the killing of Americans. A visa is a privilege not a right. Glorifying and supporting terrorists who kill Americans is grounds for visa issuance to be terminated. This is commonsense security."

https://abcnews.go.com/US/tufts-phd-student-visa-arrested-im...

Also, anything of this sort should go through the legal system first. She’s not Bin Laden, there’s no movie-plot bomb with a countdown timer, they should be expected to file charges and allow her to confront the evidence rather than abducting her with a bunch of masked officers who aren’t even in uniform.

Typically pro-Palestinian student activists in the US go to lengths to not support Hamas and generally have multiple statements to that end.

To date, to the best of my searching, the DHS claims have not been backed up.

  In a statement to the Guardian, a DHS spokesperson said on Wednesday that Ozturk was “granted the privilege to be in this country on a visa” and, without supplying any proof, accused her of supporting Hamas, the Islamist group that controls Gaza and led the attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, prompting a massive military response from Israel.

~ https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/mar/26/ice-agents-d...

I say what I mean and prefer that others not strawman my comments.

"Typically" does not mean "always".

That's an understandable mistake on your part if english is your second or third language.

I am interested in the mechanistic approach which would drive the interventions by the feds.

* are people suggesting targets? who would that be? is this organized online somewhere?

* is there a 'u-tip' number people can dial anonymously?

* is this based on some metric over feed analysis, and smart tools so there's a threshold test in software and a priority list which is run as a join over immigration status?

I'm not asking people to break OPSEC, this is in the spirit of "how exactly did Hollerith cards help the bad people do the information processing" of past times.

I should add, posting to HN very probably now adds to a net-negative score coming in through USCBP. Thats sad.

Here's her essay:

https://www.tuftsdaily.com/article/2024/03/4ftk27sm6jkj

The op-ed criticizes Tufts University’s dismissal of three resolutions passed by the Tufts Community Union Senate, which demand the university recognize alleged genocide in Palestine, divest from companies tied to Israel, and disclose its investments.

No support for Hamas that I can see.

This student was ambushed and arrested... for the crime of being one of several authors of an opinion essay published last March in the Tufts student newspaper. The essay criticized university leaders for their response to demands that Tufts “acknowledge the Palestinian genocide” and divest itself from companies with ties to Israel.

Given the amount of firearms in the USA and stand your ground laws, it seems like being a masked, unidentified kidnapper would be dangerous.

see also

* https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43485577

* https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43487465