Cornell Orders Pro-Palestine Students Back to U.S., Risking Their ICE Detention

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One of the entrances to the Cornell University campus on Nov. 3, 2023, in Ithaca, New York.<br>Photo: Matt Burkhartt/Getty Images

Cornell University is reneging on its pledge to help two graduate students avoid immigration detention by threatening to cut their funding if they don’t return to the United States, where the Trump administration has targeted them for possible deportation over their participation in a pro-Palestine protest.

The Ivy League university had previously told Momodou Taal and Amandla Thomas-Johnson that they could finish their degrees with funding abroad, according to both Taal and Cornell’s graduate student union. After the Trump administration began to pursue both students in March 2025, Taal and Thomas-Johnson fled to Cairo and planned to complete their studies there. Taal’s attorney said the students are not sure if there’s a deportation order against them, but Homeland Security Investigations, the Immigrations and Customs Enforcement intelligence division, has launched inquiries concerning both of them, and Taal was ordered to appear at an ICE office last year. The students believe they would likely be detained by immigration authorities upon return to the U.S.

Now, the school says the two students must teach on campus in Ithaca, New York, this fall or lose their funding.

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“Either they knew I can’t come back, which is probably most likely, or they actually want me to come back and get arrested on arrival,” Taal told The Intercept in an interview. “Because of my Palestine activism, I’ve been treated even differently than people who are in similar circumstances.”

The school has previously worked with other students experiencing visa issues to continue their studies abroad with funding, noted Taal and Ewa Nizalowska, president of the Cornell graduate student union.

Cornell declined to comment on Taal and Thomas-Johnson’s cases, but in a written statement to The Intercept, a spokesperson called the idea that the university was targeting students for protest activity “untrue and unfounded.” The spokesperson added that “Cornell University remains deeply committed to helping international students continue making academic progress when they encounter visa or travel-related challenges.”

The Cornell funding is the sole source of financial support for Taal and Thomas-Johnson, they told The Intercept. Losing it would hurt their ability to pay for housing, food, healthcare, and other living expenses.

“I have no money. … I’m where I am because the cost of living is cheaper,” Thomas-Johnson said. “I go through day-to-day anxiety — how can I be expected to finish a Ph.D.?”

“If I don’t get funding, I’m going to be homeless,” Taal said. “I’m not going to be able to make rent.”

The Cornell spokesperson added that the students outside the U.S. can apply for fellowships for funding, but those opportunities for the coming semester were closed months ago, Taal said.

“If I don’t get funding, I’m going to be homeless.”

“Cornell knows full well that Momodou would be immediately detained and sent to one of the places where more people are dying than ever before, facing all sorts of abuse, simply for his speech,” said Eric Lee, a civil rights attorney representing Taal. “For the university to claim that they’re offering something fair is a level of cynicism which can only be deliberate by an institution with the experience of Cornell.”

In March 2025, Taal, a British and Gambian dual citizen, and Thomas-Johnson, also a British citizen, fled the country amid a rash of deportation cases in which the Trump administration was targeting international student activists who had been involved in campus protests against Israel’s genocide and apartheid of Palestinians. They were trying to avoid the treatment given to high-profile figures like Columbia University students Mahmoud Khalil and Mohsen Madhawi.

Taal and Thomas-Johsnon had taken part in a September 2024 protest that shut down a Cornell job fair where weapons manufacturers Boeing and L3Harris, which supply weapons to Israel, had booths. The pair of students were suspended for the incident and banned from campus with threat of possible expulsion, which would have exposed them to deportation.

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