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Around Six GU Community Members’ Visas Terminated

Nora Toscano Senior News Editor

The federal government has terminated about six Georgetown University community members’ immigration statuses, according to an update posted on a university webpage April 9. The webpage, on the university’s International Student & Scholar Services website, says the university had not been officially notified of the terminations by the government. “We are aware of approximately six community members who have had their immigration status terminated,” the webpage reads. “The reasons given for such terminations are limited and Georgetown University was not informed of them by the government.” “The Office of Global Services is continuously monitoring all F-1 and J-1 student and scholar records in the Student and Exchange Visitor Information System (SEVIS) and will reach out to impacted students and J-1 scholars to provide information and resources,” the website adds. A university spokesperson said diverse dialogue is essential to the university’s Jesuit mission. “Georgetown is a global research university guided by a Jesuit commitment to engage all over the world to promote the common good,” the spokesperson wrote to The Hoya. “Central to Georgetown’s mission as a Catholic and Jesuit institution and guided by Georgetown’s founding as a university for students of all faiths, Georgetown promotes interreligious understanding and dialogue among community members of all religious and non-religious backgrounds.” The university’s update comes less than a month after federal immigration officials revoked the visa of and detained Badar Khan Suri, a Georgetown postdoctoral researcher working at the School of Foreign Service’s Alwaleed Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding (ACMCU), for alleged pro-Hamas speech on social media. ACMCU Director Nader Hashemi said the university should continue to support international students.

“Six lives have effectively been destroyed,” Hashemi told The Hoya. “I hope the university will live up to its pledges to support students in this difficult moment, particularly international students who’ve been affected.” Nico Cefalu (CAS ’27), president of Georgetown’s chapter of the legal advocacy nonprofit American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), said the Georgetown community should come together in support of those whose visas have been terminated. “I think the university should obviously try to fight this as much as they can and support these students,” Cefalu told The Hoya. “And I think we as students, once we figure out who these people are, we need to offer them support, and maybe we should plan a protest or something, because this is getting ridiculous.” “It’s just going to keep escalating,” Cefalu added. “They’re just going to keep extending who they try to kick out of universities.” GUSA Vice President Darius Wagner (CAS ’27) said students must show support for one another through precarious times. “It’s truly a really grave time when friends that you know or peers that you know, peers that you share the classroom with, can literally have their whole life changed for simply engaging in debate, posting on social media, using their free speech that they’re allotted as students in this country,” Wagner told The Hoya. “It’s just a really scary time. And I know that in the future, that through further collective action, we can ensure the safety and community of our fellow Hoyas.” Hashemi said the Georgetown community cannot be complacent in light of the visa terminations. “The worst thing you can do is pretend, ‘Well, this doesn’t affect me. I’m not interested in the Israel-Palestine conflict. This is a passing moment,’” Hashemi said. “It’s not a passing moment. It’s a straight transition toward authoritarianism.”

ARIA ZHU/THE HOYA, WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

Publicly available flight logs suggest that the Georgetown University men’s basketball team flew aborad the ICE-contracted charter airline GlobalX to reach away games — flying abroad the aircraft which later carried deported migrants to Central America.

GU Basketball’s Links to Deportation Planes Evie Steele, Nora Toscano, Jack Willis, Sophia Lu, Caleigh Keating, Aamir Jamil and Maren Fagan Editor in Chief, Senior News Editors, Senior Sports Editors, Executive Editors

On Dec. 14, hours after the Georgetown University men’s basketball team defeated the Syracuse University Orange, a chartered GlobalX airplane with tail number N837VA took off from Syracuse, N.Y., and landed at Dulles International Airport (IAD) in Washington, D.C.

Three months later, on March 18, the same GlobalX aircraft flew from Richmond, Va. — roughly 30 minutes from the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) field office where detained Georgetown postdoctoral researcher Badar Khan Suri was held that morning — to Alexandria, La., where an ICE database located him that evening. Tom Cartwright, a retired banking executive who has tracked deportation flights since 2020, said Khan Suri’s description of the aircraft and flight data makes it likely he was aboard N837VA.

“That definitely sounds like an ICE flight,” Cartwright told The Hoya. “That’s highly, highly probable.” Publicly available flight data suggests the Georgetown men’s basketball team used the same planes to travel for away games that ICE uses to transport detainees and deport migrants. The data suggests that the team flew round-trip flights to and from eight away games between Dec. 12 and March 8 with GlobalX, otherwise known as Global Crossing Airlines — an airline that has become the single largest

federal subcontractor of ICE deportation flights. One or two days before each of these eight games, a GlobalX chartered aircraft flying as GlobalX Flight 4640 flew directly from Dulles to the away game location, spanning the United States from Providence, R.I., to Omaha, Neb. Within five hours after the end of each game, GlobalX chartered planes flying as GlobalX Flight 4641 flew return flights back to Dulles. A university spokesperson did not See PLANES, A7

GU Undergraduates Prepare For Israel Divestment Referendum Nora Toscano and Jack Willis Senior News Editors

TONY PELTIER/THE HOYA

Lawyers for detained Georgetown University researcher Badar Khan Suri and attorneys for the U.S. Department of Justice are filing dueling motions on jurisdiction.

TrackingKhanSuri’sLegalBattle As Lawyers Prepare for Hearing Aamir Jamil Executive Editor

Awaiting a May 1 hearing in Virginia, lawyers for detained Georgetown University researcher Badar Khan Suri and attorneys from the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) have exchanged several motions regarding jurisdiction and Khan Suri’s detention. Federal immigration agents detained Khan Suri, a senior fellow

at Georgetown University’s Alwaleed Bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding (ACMCU), March 17. As of April 11, a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) online locator shows Khan Suri is in a detention facility in Alvarado, Texas, where a hearing in immigration court is scheduled for May 6. TheU.S.DepartmentofStaterevoked Khan Suri’s J-1 visa, a non-immigrant

visa for foreign nationals to participate in educational programs, March 15. The federal government alleges Khan Suri is connected to Hamas leadership because his father-in-lawwas an adviser to Hamas officials over a decade ago. Khan Suri also allegedly posted “Hamas propaganda” on the social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter, and Facebook. See KHAN SURI, A7

Georgetown University undergraduates voiced worries and excitement in advance of the April 14-16 referendum on whether the university should divest from companies and academic institutions linked to Israel’s government. The Georgetown University Student Association (GUSA) Senate, the legislative body of Georgetown’s student government, voted April 6 to place the nonbinding question before the student body. To pass, the referendum will require a 25% turnout and a majority vote. Meriam Ahmad (SFS ’26), the GUSA senator who introduced the referendum with senator Sienna Lipton (CAS ’27), said it enables students to communicate their opinions on a nationwide conversation to the university. “My colleague and I worked to introduce this referendum because we believe that students should have the opportunity to voice their opinions on a question that has been asked across the country,” Ahmad wrote to The Hoya. “A referendum allows the student body to make

See GOLDWATER, A7

MAREN FAGAN/THE HOYA

Georgetown students expressed differing reactions to GUSA’s vote See REFERENDUM, A7 advancing a student referendum on university divestment.

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