


A second person has been arrested by immigration officials after participating in pro-Palestinian protests at Columbia University while another student had their visa revoked, the Department of Homeland Security has announced.
Leqaa Kordia, a Palestinian from the West Bank, was arrested by ICE for overstaying her expired F-1 student visa, DHS said. Her visa was terminated on Jan. 26, 2022, for “lack of attendance” and she was previously arrested for her involvement in protests at Columbia in April 2024, the department said on Friday.
Ranjani Srinivasan, an Indian citizen and doctoral student, had her visa revoked on March 5 “for advocating for violence and terrorism,” officials said. She later opted to “self-deport.”
“It is a privilege to be granted a visa to live and study in the United States of America,” Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said. “When you advocate for violence and terrorism that privilege should be revoked, and you should not be in this country. I am glad to see one of the Columbia University terrorist sympathizers use the CBP Home app to self-deport.”
Columbia University this past week also punished several students who occupied a campus building in a pro-Palestine demonstration. Several Columbia students in April 2024 entered the school’s Hamilton Hall, renaming it “Hind’s Hall” after a Palestinian child.
The announcement by Homeland Security also comes after the recent arrest of Mahmoud Khalil, a pro-Palestinian activist who helped lead student protests and is facing deportation.
Khalil, who has a green card, was arrested last weekend at his campus apartment in front of his pregnant wife and quickly taken to Louisiana where he was placed in an immigration detention center.
On Monday, a federal judge halted an effort to deport him before he appeared in court on Wednesday, where his attorneys said they had not been allowed any attorney-client-protected communications with Khalil since his arrest and had been told they could speak to him in 10 days.
Lawyers said that Khalil’s treatment by federal authorities reminded him of when he left Syria shortly after the forced disappearance of his friends there during a period of arbitrary detention in 2013.
“Throughout this process, Mr. Khalil felt as though he was being kidnapped,” the lawyers wrote of his treatment.
President Donald Trump marked his arrest as the first of many to come.
“We know there are more students at Columbia and other Universities across the Country who have engaged in pro-terrorist, anti-Semitic, anti-American activity, and the Trump Administration will not tolerate it,” Trump previously wrote on Truth Social. “Many are not students, they are paid agitators. We will find, apprehend, and deport these terrorist sympathizers from our country — never to return again.”
In court papers, lawyers for the Justice Department said Khalil was detained under a law allowing Secretary of State Marco Rubio to remove someone from the country if he has reasonable grounds to believe their presence or activities would have potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences.
Trump and Rubio were added as defendants in the civil lawsuit seeking to free Khalil.
Editor’s note: The Associated Press contributed to this article. Have a news tip? Contact Alexx Altman-Devilbiss at aaltman-devilbiss@sbgtv.com.