BOSTON — Rümeysa Öztürk, the Tufts University student detained by ICE last year, says she has returned to Turkey following the completion of her PHD program.
Öztürk says the return to her home county was always her plan but called the over six weeks she spent in federal custody “time stolen” from her.
Öztürk, who achieved her PHD in child study and human development, was arrested while walking near her apartment in Somerville last March.
“After 13 years of dedicated study, I am very proud to have completed my Ph.D. and to return home on my own timeline,” Öztürk said in a statement released through the ACLU. “The time stolen from me by the U.S. government belongs not just to me, but to the children and youth I have dedicated my life to advocating for. With them in mind, I am choosing to return home as planned to continue my career as a woman scholar without losing more time to the state-imposed violence and hostility I have experienced in the United States – all for nothing more than co-signing an op-ed advocating for Palestinian rights. "
In an arrest caught on camera, Öztürk was surrounded by a group of masked federal agents in plain clothes as she walked along a street near her off-campus apartment on March 25, 2025.
Öztürk was on her way to meet friends for iftar, a meal that breaks a fast at sunset during Ramadan, according to her lawyer Mahsa Khanbabai.
In less than 24 hours, she was transported from Massachusetts to New Hampshire to Vermont, then down to an Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center in Basile, Louisiana, where she remained for 6 weeks.
Öztürk’s legal team has claimed that she was targeted for deportation by the federal government due to an Op-Ed she wrote in the Tufts student newspaper and for participating in pro-Palestinian demonstrations.
An immigration judge terminated the removal proceedings against Öztürk earlier this year after finding that the government had no basis to deport her.
Öztürk’s visa was terminated but she says a settlement has been to resolve outstanding legal issues in federal court and to jointly move to dismiss her immigration proceedings.
“As I start the next chapter of my life, I stand firmly in solidarity with academic communities in the U.S. and elsewhere who live in fear for nothing more than their scholarship, and with other scholars punished for their courageous advocacy for Palestine,” Dr. Öztürk continued. “I invite all universities to do better about listening and valuing all of their students as equal community members, rather than favoring some and silencing others. And I invite everyone to recognize the privilege it is for any country to host international scholars, and the hole that is left in our society when that privilege is lost.”
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