Rumeysa Ozturk is a Turkish national and who came to the United States to study at Tufts University. In March 2025, she was kidnapped off the street by immigration officers with concealed faces. The shocking video of her arrest quickly went viral and provided confirmation that the administration was targeting students for violent immigration enforcement in an unprecedented manner. She was detained in several different locations over the course of 6 weeks until a federal judge in Vermont ordered her release.
The administration targeted Ozturk for arrest and revocation of her F1 student visa status because of an op-ed she published in the Tufts Daily, the student newspaper. This op-ed was critical of the university’s response to students speaking out against the siege on Gaza. After her release from immigration detention, a federal judge ordered that her F1 status remain intact. Ozturk was able to resume her studies and completed her doctorate in February 2026.