Wisconsin Palestinian community leader can be deported, immigration judge rules

Submitted by Yasmine El-Sabawi on Wed, 09/30/2026 - 17:51 Salah Sarsour was held for 81 days in an immigration detention centre earlier this year

Patrick Taurel, left, lead immigration attorney with the firm Grossman, Young, & Hammond, shakes hands with his client, president of the Islamic Society of Milwaukee, Salah Sarsour, after an event publicising his case at Busboys and Poets in Washington, DC, on 21 September 2026 (Yasmine El-Sabawi/MEE) Off

A US immigration judge ruled on Wednesday that Salah Sarsour, a Muslim and Palestinian community leader in his hometown of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, can be deported per the wishes of the Trump administration.

In a press briefing following the decision, his lawyer, Patrick Taurel, confirmed that he will appeal.

For the time being, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) cannot re-detain Sarsour because a federal judge's order ensuring he walks free remains in place.

As with a number of Palestinian Green Card holders before Sarsour, such as former Columbia University students Mahmoud Khalil and Mohsen Mahdawi, as well as the Georgetown University scholar Badar Khan Suri, who is married to a Palestinian American, the US government arrested Salah in March on the grounds that he is a threat to national security.

His legal team and advocates maintain the arrest was because of his speech in defence of Palestinian rights. Sarsour sits on the board of American Muslims for Palestine (AMP), which pro-Israeli groups have claimed is a front for Hamas.

Hamas has been designated as a terrorist organisation in the US since the late 1990s. AMP, an advocacy organisation that lobbies lawmakers on Capitol Hill, retains its registered non-profit status in the US. Its leaders deny any such link.

Two days before Sarsour was released from 81 days in an immigration detention centre in June, two Democratic senators introduced legislation to try and repeal the previously dormant Section 237(a)(4)(C) of the Immigration and Nationality Act, which grants Secretary of State Marco Rubio "the unreviewable power to deport non-citizens whose presence in the United States would have 'potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences'".

There has been no movement on the bill since.

'They want to distract us'

A grandfather to 10 American children who has spent 32 years in the US, Sarsour told an audience at Busboys and Poets in Washington, DC, last week that he lost 35 pounds while behind bars. He is also diabetic.

"I'm not sure if angry is the right word," he told Middle East Eye about his ordeal.

"But actually, I was mistreated. I went through a very tough experience in this age, and honest, honest to God, I never thought [it] would ever happen to me again, especially in America, because of my connections, my leadership position in the community, my my business style, my living style. I thought I will never see that in my life again."

That life he refers to is when he spent nearly two and a half years behind bars in Israel, between the ages of 15 and 22.

The US government has always been aware of his past, he said, which is why he was able to obtain a Green Card - shorthand for legal permanent residency.

Sarsour "has denied the allegations in sworn declarations, and he continues to deny that he committed the crimes that he was accused of in Israel in 1994 and 1988", his lawyer, Taurel, said on Wednesday.

"An objective, fair-minded view of the evidence that was presented in this case shows that he was not convicted of throwing a Molotov cocktail, and that he was not convicted of any activity that has as an element [of] supporting a terrorist organisation. That's clear from the record," he added.

A trial will now proceed on precisely where Sarsour would be deported to, given that anyone going to the occupied West Bank requires permission from Israel, and being handed off to Israel would endanger Sarsour's life, Taurel said, as he was tortured there before.

So much so, Taurel noted, that Shin Bet officers themselves took him to the hospital.

A decision is not expected until next year.

Mahmoud Khalil sues Columbia University for allowing harassment that led to his ICE arrest Read More »

Jayme Salinardi, the immigration judge who rendered Wednesday's decision, however, notably announced her retirement from the bench, which Sarsour's lawyers described as "odd".

Salinardi had previously worked as chief counsel for ICE. Immigration judges also operate under the purview of the Department of Justice and are not as independent as federal courts.

"The immigration courts are overseen by the executive branch, so we've read a lot about the wave of retirements and resignations from other immigration judges. So I think it does feel strange," Luna Droubi, lead federal attorney with Beldock Levine & Hoffman LLP, who is representing Sarsour in his federal case, said during the press briefing.

For now, Sarsour intends to continue his advocacy work in light of Israel's continuing assault on Gaza, where 74,000 Palestinians have been killed - a figure The Lancet medical journal calls a severe undercount.

"This administration, with Israeli official support and Israeli military, [wants] to shift our focus and to distract us, because we worked very hard to put the narrative, the Palestinian narrative, the narrative against the genocide, everywhere in public," he told MEE last week.

"Let us continue the work. I will do whatever it takes from inside the detention centre, inside the jail. I will talk. I will do whatever it takes to continue supporting our just causes and especially the cause against genocide and stopping the genocide."

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