A new McCarthyism: weaponizing US Immigration laws against dissent

“First they came for the undocumented, and I did not speak out…” The haunting lesson of silence echoes loudly in the United States today, where a new witch hunt is unfolding—only this time, it’s not alleged communists but pro-Palestinian students, scholars, and legal immigrants under siege.

On March 8, 2025, Mahmoud Khalil, a Columbia University graduate student and lawful permanent resident, was detained by ICE in New York after returning from an Iftar dinner with his pregnant wife. The supposed justification? That he posed a "foreign policy threat" under a Cold War-era immigration law. In a stunning escalation, his green card was revoked on the spot—without due process—and he was swiftly transferred to a Louisiana detention center, thousands of miles from his home and legal team.

Khalil’s real “crime” wasn’t overstaying a visa or breaking any law. It was daring to speak out for Palestinian rights.

This Orwellian turn in U.S. immigration policy reflects a growing authoritarian impulse under Donald Trump’s second term. The administration has revived McCarthy-era tactics, once used to target communists, now turned on Muslim and Arab voices critical of Israel. Legal immigrants with green cards and even tourists are being detained, surveilled, and deported based not on their actions, but their opinions.

And it’s not just Khalil.

Dr. Rasha Alawieh, a Lebanese-born professor at Brown University, was deported for expressing religious support for a Hezbollah leader at a funeral—despite having a valid visa and court protection. Georgetown academic Badar Khan Suri, an Indian citizen, was snatched by masked agents in Virginia and accused—without evidence—of spreading “Hamas propaganda.” No criminal charges have been filed in any of these cases.

This targeted crackdown, cloaked in legalese, has little to do with national security and everything to do with political retribution. Lawful permanent residents cannot be criminally prosecuted for political speech, but under INA § 237(a)(4)(C)(i), their speech can still be the basis for removal if it’s deemed to cause “adverse foreign policy consequences.” In other words, dissent becomes deportable.

his obscure provision, dating back to the McCarran-Walter Act of 1952, was historically used to exclude leftist voices. Today, it’s being used to muzzle criticism of U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East, particularly concerning Israel and Palestine. It has become the legal linchpin of what critics are calling a “new McCarthyism.”

The scale is staggering.

According to Reuters, thousands of federal agents—from the IRS to ATF—have been diverted from their core missions to enforce Trump’s mass deportation agenda. Investigators who once tracked child sex trafficking and drug cartels are now raiding small businesses and surveilling campuses. The Department of Homeland Security has reportedly launched an AI-powered “Catch and Revoke” program to scan social media posts for political dissent among visa holders.

Even scholars are being watched. Private pro-Israel organizations are compiling facial recognition data and submitting lists of foreign students for deportation. Incredibly, some university trustees, as reported by The Forward, secretly flagged Khalil and other students to federal authorities—converting campuses into informant zones reminiscent of 1950s loyalty boards.

This is not law enforcement. This is ideological cleansing.

What makes this even more chilling is that it’s bipartisan silence that enables it. Universities, afraid of losing funding or reputational damage, have largely complied or stayed quiet. Columbia University, where Khalil was abducted, has yet to publicly defend him. Meanwhile, Trump’s executive order stripped the school of $400 million in federal funding, accusing it of harboring “terrorist sympathizers.”

This echoes the Red Scare when professors lost jobs, artists were blacklisted, and immigrants were deported under flimsy pretexts. Today, the targets are Muslim, Arab, and progressive scholars who dare to criticize Israeli policy or express solidarity with Palestinians. Tomorrow, it could be anyone.

The legal precedent may not be on the government’s side. Khalil’s attorneys have cited Ragbir v. Homan (2nd Cir. 2018), which ruled that retaliatory deportation based on protected speech violates constitutional rights. But the Trump administration appears undeterred, forum-shopping cases into conservative courts like the Fifth Circuit, which has among the highest asylum denial rates in the nation.

What’s unfolding is not just a legal battle—it’s a moral crisis. If a permanent resident like Khalil can be exiled for peaceful protest, then millions of others are vulnerable. The U.S. risks turning into a nation where visas and green cards are not legal statuses but political litmus tests.

This is not just an American story. For countries like India, with large diasporas in the U.S., and especially for Muslim-majority nations, this should be a warning. If lawful, peaceful expression can become grounds for deportation, then no immigrant is truly safe. As the world watches the dismantling of democracy under the guise of security, we must remember: silence is complicity.

McCarthyism did not end because it ran out of targets—it ended because people spoke up.

Will we?

(Faisal Kutty is a Toronto-based lawyer and regular contributor to The Toronto Star. His articles also appear in Newsweek, Aljazeera, Zeteo, and Middle East Eye. You can follow him on X @faisalkutty)