Expert Q+A with Sumayyah Waheed, Muslim Advocates
Expert Q+A w/ Sumayyah Waheed
Sumayyah Waheed, Senior Policy Counsel at Muslim Advocates
A few days ago, The New York Times reported that the Trump administration is planning to limit green card access for nationals of countries listed in the June travel ban proclamation, intensifying an already restrictive immigration policy. Why should we be concerned about this, and what do you think the ramifications might be?
Yes, the reporting indicates that limits wouldn’t just apply to green card applicants, but also to applicants for asylum, parole and a variety of other statuses. If implemented, it would represent a seismic shift in immigration policy. It would mean that the administration wants to eject people from the country based solely on where they were born. That is patently unconstitutional.
The purported justification for the travel and entry ban was “national security,” an invocation historically weaponized to justify racial and religious profiling against Black, African, Arab, Middle Eastern, Muslim and South Asian communities. As inherently flawed as that logic is, it just does not extend to the hundreds of thousands of people who are already here and (re)made their lives, dutifully following a process that the administration now wants to snatch out from under them. I also can’t stress enough that people within the U.S. are protected by the Constitution, which prohibits unlawful discrimination, including on the basis of national origin.
Put simply, this radical expansion of the travel and entry bans would further expose the bans’ true motivations: racial and ethnic bias, pure and simple.
2. Earlier this week, Muslim Advocates represented Syrian nationals suing the Trump administration for terminating their Temporary Protected Status (TPS). What did you raise, what happened in the courtroom and what’s the outlook for Syrian nationals and other TPS holders?
With our co-counsel, International Refugee Assistance Project (IRAP) and Van Der Hout LLP, we represent family caretakers, doctors, students, teachers, business professionals, and others whose work and identities are part of the rich fabric of our communities. We argued that without court intervention, after November 21 (this Friday!) more than 6,100 Syrians could lose their legal status and work authorization and could be forced to relocate to Syria – a country ravaged and still reeling from nearly 14 years of civil war.
On Monday (Nov. 17), the court heard oral arguments in our case, called Dahlia Doe v. Noem. We argued that the administration’s termination of Syrian TPS violates the law because the administration failed to follow required procedures (like considering objective evidence of conditions in Syria and doing so in consultation with appropriate agencies, like the U.S. Department of State) and by providing impacted people a mere 60-day notice rather than many months, as was past practice.
We also argued that the administration had predetermined to end Syrian TPS, in violation of statute and the Constitution, and based on a broad, discriminatory policy of terminating TPS for countries that are not majority white.
During the court hearing, Judge Katherine Polk Failla of the Southern District of New York indicated that she thinks the harms that plaintiffs and other impacted Syrians would face because of the termination of Syrian TPS outweigh any harms to the government if the termination were to be postponed.
We are expecting Judge Failla to issue a decision today (Nov. 19) on the request for emergency postponement of the termination. It will be a timely decision affecting thousands of Syrians who have put down roots in the U.S. but would face arrest, detention and deportation without court action. The court will issue its oral decision on Wednesday, November 19, 2025 at 3:00 p.m., via video conference with public audio-only access at (855) 244-8681, access code 2315 780 7370.
3. You’re part of the legal team representing Leqaa Kordia, a Palestinian woman believed to be the last remaining Columbia protester in ICE custody. Why hasn’t Kordia been released yet?
Leqaa Kordia is a young Palestinian American woman who grew up in the West Bank, and spent the last nine years forming deep roots in Paterson, New Jersey with her family and friends. She is a beloved member of her community and I invite folks to read her powerful open letter, hear her in her own words, and to listen to two of her lawyers talk about her humor, spirituality, and artistic passions.
Leqaa has faced trauma most of us cannot imagine. She has lost 175 members of her family to Israel’s genocide against Palestinians over the past two years.
Leqaa has now been locked up in immigration jail for eight months, simply for attending a protest that called for an end to this genocide. She was shipped from her home and family in New Jersey to an ICE detention center in Texas, over 1,500 miles away. She has been denied access to halal food, prayer accommodations, and has lost significant weight.
The Trump Administration has been playing procedural games to keep her locked up indefinitely. An immigration judge has thoroughly reviewed the evidence in Leqaa's case not once, but twice. And each time, she has concluded that Leqaa is neither a danger nor unreleasable based on flight risk. But DHS ignores these conclusions and utilizes obscure mechanisms to keep her locked up. Grassroots activists have set up an Instagram account and action page to apply political pressure to demand her release.
The Trump Administration continues to level baseless accusations and evade the rule of law as part of its broader crackdown on freedom of expression and criminalization of peaceful protest. Mahmoud Khalil, Rümeysa Öztürk, Badar Khan Suri, and Mohsen Mahdawi have also faced retaliatory immigration confinement for supporting Palestinian rights, and have since been released. Leqaa Kordia also deserves her freedom, and a chance to reunite with her family in New Jersey.
4. What advice are you giving to protesters in the current political climate?
We firmly reiterate that everyone in the U.S. has First Amendment rights, regardless of their citizenship, and we recognize that our current fascist government is abusing its power to punish both U.S. citizens and non-citizens for speech that the government dislikes, in flagrant violation of the Constitution. For non-citizens who fear retaliation for their political speech, identity, and/or associations, we provide individualized advisals to help assess their risks, prepare defensive materials (including back-pocket emergency lawsuits), and minimize harm. We’ve also provided impacted community members robust Know Your Rights trainings, including to members of labor unions, academic associations, and advocacy organizations.
5. In what ways is your organization, Muslim Advocates, challenging Trump’s entry bans, issued in June, which target 19 mostly Muslim and Black majority countries? How are these entry bans connected to the lawsuits you’re involved in?
In the current landscape – post-Trump v. Hawaii – our options have become more limited. The latest entry bans seem intended to stay within the lines that have been drawn by the Supreme Court in that case. In Trump v. Hawaii the Supreme Court ignored President Trump’s overtly anti-Muslim public statements and upheld his 2017 “Muslim ban” in deference to the President’s asserted national security justifications. That leaves us with fewer options to challenge the legality of the bans, as they’re written. However, we’ve already seen lawsuits challenging the latest bans mostly aimed at how the administration is implementing them. You can read about examples here and here.
These racist entry bans are one piece of a broader attack on Black, Brown, and Muslim identity and viewpoints. From L.A. to D.C. and Chicago, this regime terrorizes communities and tears families apart through the bans, deploys violent ICE raids that racially profile Latine and Black residents, and weaponized the National Guard against protesters and cities run by their political opponents.
Our lawsuit on behalf of Syrian TPS holders represents one example of an overall assault against TPS protections for people from Black, Brown and Muslim-majority countries. The Trump regime has also blocked asylum and all but shut down the refugee program to anyone except certain white people.
We’re also challenging the government’s viewpoint-driven surveillance and public intimidation campaign that punishes and silences non-citizens who express views it dislikes.
These policies seek to destroy the pluralistic fabric of our nation by exploiting racism, anti-Muslim bigotry, and xenophobia–all in service of an even broader fascist power grab. We resist by telling our stories, building solidarity and power across marginalized communities, and demanding justice from courts and Congress.