Court orders Rumeysa Ozturk, pro-Hamas student detained by ICE, returned to Vermont

A federal appeals court panel blocked on Wednesday the Trump administration's request to lift a judge's order to physically transfer the detained student, Rumeysa Ozturk, from Louisiana to Vermont.

On March 25, the Turkish student was detained by ICE agents after she wrote a pro-Hamas opinion piece in her student newspaper. Following the arrest, which occurred in Somerville, Massachusetts, authorities transferred her to Vermont and then to Louisiana.

On April 18, US District Judge William K. Sessions III, who practices in Vermont, ruled that Ozturk's lawsuit could be filed in his court because that was where she was when her lawyers filed the petition. Sessions ordered the government to physically return Ozturk to the state while the impeachment proceeded.

The administration appealed that decision before the 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals, which on Wednesday refused to stop the order after hearing oral arguments a day earlier.

The new order sets May 14 as the deadline for the government to return Ozturk to Vermont, where she will remain in detention.

"The Court orders that Ms. Ozturk be physically removed to ICE custody within the District of Vermont no later than May 14, 2025," wrote appeals court Judges Barrington Parker, Susan Carney and Alison Nathan.