Tufts University student Rumeysa Ozturk was released from ICE detention on Friday, offering brief words of thanks to supporters gathered outside the Louisiana facility.
"Thank you so much for all the support and love," she said.
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Her release came hours after a federal court hearing in which Ozturk spoke — and had an apparent asthma attack — and Judge Williams Sessions ordered the woman's release, with no travel restrictions. She must participate in support and supervision programs through the Burlington Justice Center.
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SIGN UP Ozturk's case has been closely watched after her detention near her Somerville, Massachusetts, home in late March was caught on video.
What happened in Ozturk's federal hearing
In siding with Ozturk, Sessions' wording was strong — the judge said her free speech rights were violated, that her continued detention in Louisiana would seriously impact her health and that she poses no risk to the community.
He also criticized the government for not providing any evidence to justify the student's arrest, other thanan op-ed she co-wrote last year in the campus newspaper, which Secretary of State Marco Rubio has alluded to, criticizing the university's response to student activists and calling on Tufts to divest from companies with ties to Israel.
Ozturk, who appeared virtually for the bail hearing Friday morning in Vermont, had appeared emotional when she found out, at the end of the hearing, that she was going to be released.
Ozturk had been held for the last six weeks in Basile as her lawyers fought to have the government release her. The case will continue in Vermont after she returns to Massachusetts, likely staying in housing provided by Tufts.
Beyond the ruling and the legal stakes, it was a dramatic hearing. Ozturk has asthma, and during the hearing, while a doctor who specializes in asthma was testifying, Ozturk began coughing, leading an attorney in the room with her at the Basile, Louisiana, ICE facility, to interrupt the hearing and rush her out of the room to get her inhaler.
The hearing continued while she was being treated.
Reaction in Mass. and in the Trump administration
Ozturk's congressional representatives, Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey and Rep. Ayanna Pressley, cheered the decision, writing in a statement, "Rümeysa is a cherished member of her community, and we are relieved that she can finally return to Massachusetts. This is a victory for Rümeysa, for justice, and for our democracy."
Free speech groups like FIRE and the ACLU also celebrated the student's release.
"It’s a very strong message to people watching that you can be punished by your speech and what we heard from the court today was confirmation that it’s not what we do in this country," ACLU of Massachusetts staff attorney Jessie Rossman said.
But the White House derided the decision.
"Lower level judges should not be dictating the foreign policy of the United States," said press secretary Karoline Leavitt, while top Trump advisor Stephen Miller called the ruling a "judicial coup by a handful of Marxist judges" and added, "We cannot individually litigate in court every single visa that we want to revoke."
The Department of Homeland Security shared a statement in response that didn't mention Ozturk directly: "Visas provided to foreign students to live and study in the United States are a privilege not a right. The Trump administration is committed to restoring the rule of law and common sense to our immigration system, and will continue to fight for the arrest, detention, and removal of aliens who have no right to be in this country."
Friday's hearing came after a circuit court of appeals in New York this week rejected a petition from the Trump administration to keep her in Louisiana.
More on Rumeysa Ozturk's caught-on-video detention
The Turkish student was surrounded by a handful of ICE agents near her home on March 25, days after the state department cancelled her student visa -- without informing her, according to her lawyer -- for allegedly supporting Hamas, a U.S.-designated terrorist group.
Ozturk's lawyers have complained that she hasn't been charged with any crime and is being silenced.
They have been wanting to move her out of Louisiana, away from a conservative circuit court. They say she's been kept in unsanitary conditions and that her detention violates her constitutional rights, including free speech and due process.
Ozturk already had a judge in Louisiana deny her bond a few weeks ago, but that was before her case was transferred to Vermont.
