Thousands of students across the U.S. have participated in pro-Palestinian demonstrations, urging their schools to divest from companies selling weapons to Israel amid its ongoing war in Gaza.
But while most are American citizens, Momodou Taal, a 30-year-old PhD student at Cornell University and a British national, is facing the possibility of being forced to leave the country because of it.
A third-year PhD candidate in Africana studies who also teaches a first-year writing seminar called “What is Blackness? Race and Processes of Racialization,” Taal is at Cornell in Ithaca, New York, under the F-1 student visa program.
He was among four Cornell students suspended in the spring for participating in a pro-Palestinian encampment on campus. The university informed Taal of a second “temporary suspension” on Monday in connection with a protest on September 18.
University officials have told Taal that the latest suspension would lead to his F-1 visa being terminated, which he says means he is “effectively” facing deportation.
The unsettling prospect is one that Taal and other international students who have taken part in pro-Palestinian protests have faced since such demonstrations erupted across college campuses in the spring, leading to universities cracking down.
Colleges have since rolled out security measures and protest guidelines to avoid similar disruptions this semester, and the tent encampments seen on many campuses in the spring have not returned. Still, students are continuing to protest amid the rising death toll in Gaza. But until now, there have been no reported instances of an international student being expelled from the country because of it.
Taal said he feels Cornell has singled him out for disciplinary action, with the aim of having a chilling effect on student protests. “They want to make an example, a loud example, so it will scare other students not to be involved in pro-Palestinian organizing,” he told Newsweek.
In a statement to Newsweek through a university spokesperson, Joel M. Malina, the vice president of university relations, said: “International students attending college in the U.S. on F-1 visas are obligated to comply with federal requirements to maintain their visa status. These federal requirements include remaining enrolled as a full-time registered student.”
Universities “are required by federal regulation to terminate the F-1 status for any student who is not permitted to be enrolled due to a disciplinary action,” Malina added. “Any international student administratively withdrawn by Cornell pursuant to the Student Code of Conduct is urged to immediately review immigration guidelines and consult with experts. Universities can disallow enrollment and bar a student from campus, but do not have deportation powers.”
Taal responded: “It’s semantics, though, isn’t it? I’ve asked them to give me another word for forcibly telling someone to leave the country.”
The university spokesperson also directed Newsweek to a statement from Michael I. Kotlikoff, Cornell’s interim president, which said the protesters had displayed “intentionally menacing behavior” at the September 18 protest that shut down a career fair at the Statler Hotel on Cornell’s campus.
“The demonstrators forcibly entered the hotel by pushing aside Cornell Police Officers,” Kotlikoff said. He claimed that their entry into a ballroom inside the hotel had knocked off “an officer’s body-worn camera” and that once inside, their use of bullhorns, cymbals, pots, and pans “resulted in medical complaints of potential hearing loss.”
Kotlikoff said individuals who entered the hotel would “face immediate suspension or employment sanctions up to and including dismissal.” Asked if any students other than Taal were facing disciplinary action, a Cornell spokesperson said they “don’t have additional information to share.”
Taal denied being involved in any violence toward police officers. The university’s student newspaper, Cornell Sun, said that its reporters who were on the scene did not observe any physical violence toward law enforcement.
Momodou Taal
Taal said he had briefly spoken outside the hotel during the September 18 protest, which was organized by the Coalition for Mutual Liberation, a student-led coalition calling on Cornell to divest from “any company complicit in genocide, apartheid, or systematic cruelty against children perpetrated against Palestinians.” He said the protesters later disrupted the fair because it featured Boeing and L3Harris, which manufacture weapons that are supplied to the Israeli military.
Taal said he was only inside the hotel for about five minutes and left before the fair was shut down. But he said that Cornell University Police Chief Anthony Bellamy had recognized him from the encampment earlier this year as he was on his way out.
“He kind of made a funny sound at me, and then I just carried on walking,” he said. “The next day, I received an email saying that he has reported me.”
Bellamy has been contacted for comment via email to the Cornell University Police Department (CUPD).
The police complaint against Taal, which Newsweek reviewed, was sent to the Office of Student Conduct and Community Standards (OSCCS) and alleges that Taal violated the university’s code of conduct because he “repeatedly failed to comply with the lawful directives of university officials to back away” from the entrances of the Statler Hotel and a ballroom inside.
It also alleges that he made “unauthorized use of university property by entering the hotel immediately behind individuals who had used force to gain entry” and that once inside, he “intentionally led or repeated chants that were unreasonably loud resulting in the significant disruption of university activities.”
The OSCCS then informed Taal in a letter, which Newsweek also reviewed, that he was “temporarily suspended” and a “persona non grata” would be issued for the duration of the temporary suspension, prohibiting him from campus.
Taal said he was told by a university official during a Monday meeting that his withdrawal would soon become official, after which he would lose his F-1 visa status, and directed to contact the university’s senior immigration adviser.
The adviser explained to Taal in an email, which Newsweek has seen, that “we must close your F-1 record on the effective date of your suspension and discontinuation from your program” and that once it happened, there is “no grace period for your departure” from the U.S.
Andrew Lichtenstein/Corbis via Getty Images
“You should leave either before the end date of your F-1 record or right away after the record is closed,” the adviser added. “If you wish to remain in the U.S. on a tourist visa, then you must seek legal advice from a licensed immigration attorney on how to apply for a change of status.”
Taal says he is “trying to fight” and has retained a lawyer, and wants Cornell to follow its own policies by conducting an investigation and giving him due process to respond to the allegations against him.
According to Cornell’s policy, temporarily suspended students may file a written request to lift the suspension to the University Hearing and Review Board, which is then reviewed by three board members, including a student, a faculty member and a nonfaculty member within five business days. If the panel determines that the cause of the temporary suspension is “inadequate or absent” or that the circumstances have changed so it is no longer necessary, it can be immediately lifted.
Students, staff and others have rallied behind Taal.
Students held a rally in support of Taal on Wednesday, and at least 7,000 people have signed an open letter demanding Taal’s reinstatement.
“This is the first time a Cornell graduate worker is facing immediate deportation without administrative due process or the ability to review evidence of their alleged misconduct,” it says. “Unless we stand up to the university, it is entirely plausible that at any moment, Momodou will have less than a 48 hours notice to book a flight, pack up all of his belongings, and get out of the country.”
The Cornell Chapter of the American Association of University Professors called on the university to rescind Taal’s temporary suspension in an op-ed in the Cornell Sun on Wednesday, saying the university’s “unjust and unjustified response to the protests violates academic freedom and freedom of expression.”
The student newspaper’s editorial board on Friday called on Cornell’s top administrators “to go back to square one, reevaluate their biases, provide due process and reverse this specific targeted, unjust and possibly illegal suspension.”
On Thursday, Taal posted on social media that his appeal of his temporary suspension had been rejected by Ryan Lombardi, the vice president of student and campus life, after just a day.
“This demonstrates once again that my ability to stay in this country is being hastily handled without due process in a continued attempt to silence me,” he wrote on X, formerly Twitter.
Update:
The VP of student and campus life, Ryan Lombardi, rejected my appeal after one business day. This demonstrates once again that my ability to stay in this country is being hastily handled without due process in a continued attempt to silence me.
I have until 5pm…
— Momodou ✊🏿 (@MomodouTaal) September 26, 2024
“I have until 5 p.m. [Friday] to appeal to the provost. If the provost rejects this appeal, then I believe my withdrawal will be processed and I will promptly have to leave the country.”
He added: “Once again, there has been no investigation, nor have I had a chance to even respond to the allegations against me. I maintain that all my actions have been peaceful and in accordance with my First Amendment rights.
“This is a deliberate targeting of a Black Muslim student at an institution where those two identities are increasingly unwelcome. When it comes to Palestine the university will abandon all commitments to academic freedom and free speech to protect its corporate interests.”
Taal’s attorney Eric Lee issued a statement on Thursday saying Cornell administrators had incorrectly told Taal that he must be prepared to leave the country as soon as the weekend.
“Federal immigration regulations, however, do not require universities report changes in a student’s status until several weeks later,” Lee said. “Moreover, Cornell’s threats to report Mr. Taal would have deprived him of the right to a hearing and opportunity to respond to the allegations against him.”
Cornell made the choice “to persecute Mr. Taal for free speech activity knowing full well that doing so will subject him to serious immigration consequences,” Lee added. “By proceeding in this way, Cornell’s administration is setting a dangerous national precedent and risks destroying its long-standing reputation as a center of free speech.”
To Newsweek, Taal noted that the Cornell Africana Studies and Research Center was created after a 36-hour student takeover of Willard Straight Hall in 1969.
“I’m in that department, and Cornell likes to celebrate that legacy. But when students enact similar things to say, ‘you know what? This is the issue of the day, and we’re protesting and showing solidarity,’ they will come down hard on us now, but in the future, I’m sure they’ll try and celebrate it.”
If he is ultimately forced to leave the U.S., Taal said his life will be turned “upside down.”
Still, he has no regrets about joining the protests.
“The daily horrors that we see, knowing my school has complicity with weapons manufacturers… knowing that students’ money is going toward that, I think any human being of conscience would be moved by what they see,” he said.
He thanked his supporters, but said that “it’s important to note that this issue is never divorced from Palestine. I don’t think other causes would meet the same levels of oppression.”
