Meet Leqaa Kordia: Palestinian Protester Freed After a Year in "ICE Dungeon"

Kordia's arrest and year-long detention are framed as part of a 'Trump administration's campaign targeting activists' advocating for Palestinian rights, suggesting political motivation behind immigration actions.

Arrested in March of last year as part of the Trump administration's campaign targeting activists and others who advocated for Palestinian rights. Her arrest came less than a week after federal immigration agents arrested the Colombia student protester organizer Mahmood Khalil. Lakordia is believed to have been the last person held in detention from the Trump administration's crackdown on pro Palestinian campus activists.

Kordia describes severe and systemic abuses within the Prairieland Detention Center, including extreme overcrowding and a deliberate denial of adequate medical care.

capacity is supposed to be 37 but we were like um 66 sometimes 100. Um I slept on the floor for 3 months myself. I was very sick... no one cared about me. I wasn't provided any medicine or anything. A few days later I fell down and I experienced my first ever seizure. The entire time I was chained to a hospital bed. I was denied access to my mother. I asked to speak with my lawyers. I was denied access to my lawyers.

Kordia explicitly compares the methods and conditions in ICE detention to her experiences growing up under Israeli military occupation in the West Bank.

the ice Asians methods like brought to me to my mind to my memories um a lot of bad memories from the West Bank and how uh Israeli soldiers would treat the Palestinian prisoners or um Palestinian in general. Um the humilation uh the way of like uh abusing um like mentally torturing ice dungeons are systematically built to break people mentally to break people down. There is a lot of similarities of Israel method methods and ICE methods.

Kordia argues that the US government, through actions like her detention, actively works to silence Palestinian voices and supporters, undermining principles of free speech.

for the government actually to appeal uh the the immigration uh the immigration judge decision twice... and they're accusing me they were accusing me of me being dangerous to the community for what? for calling for a ceasefire, for calling for my like the dignity of my for my people and my family, um for a free Palestine. Apparently everybody has the right to speak up. Everybody has the right to protest, but Palestinians. Um, freedom of speech comes to Palestine and ends.