FASCISM COMES, AND NOT JUST TO MAHMOUD KHALIL

Mahmoud Khalil hasn't just been arrested. He's been disappeared:

UPDATE—Mahmoud's attorney says they do NOT know where he is. They were first told he was sent to an ICE facility in Elizabeth, NJ. But when his 8-month-pregnant wife tried to visit him, she was told he's not there. They've received reports he may be sent as far away as Louisiana.

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— Prem Thakker ツ (@premthakker.bsky.social) March 9, 2025 at 3:58 PM

America used to have laws. As The New York Times reports, they're no longer in effect:

The immigration agents who detained Mr. Khalil told him his student visa had been revoked, Ms. Greer said, even though he does not currently hold such a visa. Revoking a green card is quite rare, said Elora Mukherjee, the director of the immigrants’ rights clinic at Columbia Law School, and in a vast majority of cases where it does happen, the holder has been accused and convicted of criminal offenses, she said.

If the government was to revoke Mr. Khalil’s green card “in retaliation for his public speech, that is prohibited by the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution,” Ms. Mukherjee said....

Jodi Ziesemer, the director of the immigrant protection unit at the New York Legal Assistance Group, said the revocation process is typically lengthy. A green card holder can be detained, but not deported, during that process, she said.

Well, clearly a green card holder can be treated any way the Trump regime wants him treated, because the Trumpists are the law now.

Question for the one-joke class clowns in comments (you know who you are): If Democrats are no better than Republicans when they're in office, why does it seem obvious that Republicans are much worse, particularly in this area? Do you honestly believe that President Harris would have unilaterally suspended every immigration law on the books in the United States that she didn't like? Or every law, period?

It's not just Khalil. Here are a couple of other immigration/travel horror stories I'm seeing. Hat tip to Joshua Holland for the first one:

A second German tourist is being held in a detention centre after having her Visa revoked by the U.S. It’s the same detention centre holding Jessica Brösche, the German tattoo artist who spent 8 days in solitary. She’s been held for 6 weeks. The U.S. is not a safe place to travel anymore

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— Kelly (@broadwaybabyto.bsky.social) March 9, 2025 at 4:59 PM

From a translated version of the story, which is from the Swiss newspaper Tages-Anzeiger:

Lucas Sielaff, a 25-year-old German, is being held in deportation custody at the Otay Mesa Detention Center in California. It is the same facility where the German tattoo artist Jessica Brösche is being held. Both had their entry permits for the USA (ESTA) revoked at the same Mexican land border.

Jessica Brösche has been in prison for almost six weeks. Lucas Sielaff for two....

Lennon Tyler speaks quickly but firmly into her phone. "Lucas was arrested on February 18th at the border near San Ysidro," she says. Tyler lives in Las Vegas, her partner in Bad Bibra, Germany, near Erfurt. He was visiting his fiancée and drove with her and her dog to Mexico for a visit to the vet.

On the way back, according to his fiancée, the border officials asked him where he lived. Actually, a standard question. But: "There was a misunderstanding. He answered that he lived in Las Vegas. I corrected him immediately. His English isn't very good, so he thought it was about where he wanted to go. He doesn't live in the States."

An officer from the US Customs and Border Protection then led him into a room. "They didn't let me see him or help him with the language. They didn't allow him to have another translator either," says Lennon Tyler....

Jeff Joseph, president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association, described Brösche's case to CNN as "quite unusual." Normally, travelers who enter the United States with an ESTA and are rejected would withdraw their application and return directly to their home country, rather than being deported or remaining in custody for a longer period. Brösche's extended stay in Otay Mesa was "extremely worrying."

A screewnwriter posted this, presumably in reference to Brösche:

Tourists in the US being held indefinitely for carrying work equipment (tattooing equipment, in one case)... How long before directors and screenwriters visiting L.A. for meetings - traditionally done on an ESTA tourist visa - start being held incommunicado for months for traveling with a laptop?

— Debbie Moon (@debbiemoon.bsky.social) March 10, 2025 at 6:23 AM

And why is this happening? Was this person caught at the border with subversive-looking art supplies?

Becky Burke is known in the British comics scene as writer/artist creator R.E. Burke.... She had been taking a four-month backpacking trip across North America until she was detained by I.C.E eleven days ago....

Her father Paul Burke posts to social media, under the title Urgent Appeal: Help Bring Becky Home

"Our daughter Becky, a 28-year-old British tourist, has been caught up in the recent immigration crackdown in the US. What was meant to be a life-changing four-month backpacking trip across North America has turned into a nightmare. Becky has now been detained by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) for over ten days, with no clear timeline for her release.

"On February 26th, Becky attempted to cross the Canadian border for the next leg of her journey. Unfortunately, due to an incorrect visa, she was denied entry into Canada. When she tried to return to the US, she was refused re-entry and classified as an "illegal alien." Despite being a tourist with no criminal record, she was handcuffed and taken to a detention facility in Tacoma, Washington...."

Here's a photo of the dangerous radical:

I'm looking at her work. It's about friendship, relationships, mental health issues, period pain, sourdough bread.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by R. E. Burke (@r.e.burke)

Maybe she once crashed on the floor of some Pacific Northwest anarchist. Or maybe she just looked radical.

And maybe I'm uninformed and this always happened to a certain percentage of people who crossed our borders. But what's happening now seems worse.

In any case, the treatment of Mahmoud Khalil is indefensible -- and Jamelle Bouie was right when he posted a Bluesky account of what's happening to Khalil:

re the previous repost: if they can disappear permanent residents they can disappear citizens

— jamelle (@jamellebouie.net) March 9, 2025 at 6:25 PM

And they will. You know they think they have the right.