On Monday, U.S. District Judge William K. Sessions III transferred a motion to restore Tufts graduate student Rümeysa Öztürk’s Student and Exchange Visitor Information System record from Vermont to the District of Massachusetts.
Öztürk’s attorneys seek preliminary injunctive relief to restore her SEVIS record. The termination of a SEVIS record prevents individuals with nonimmigrant student visas from being employed. Her lawyers argued that restoring her record will help her recover from “irreparable harm” that came as a result of her visa termination on March 25, which made her ineligible for employment.
The federal government argued that the District of Vermont was not the proper place for Öztürk to seek relief since she and her attorneys live in Massachusetts. They also argued that because the initial claim was a habeas corpus petition, the motion to restore her SEVIS record should not be considered with the habeas petition.
When her F-1 visa had been terminated by the State Department, Immigration Customs and Enforcement terminated her SEVIS record a few hours after her arrest.
The relief motion, if approved, would restore Öztürk’s SEVIS record from the date it was terminated by ICE — March 25. SEVIS is a web-based system operated by the Department of Homeland Security to track and monitor students on nonimmigrant visas and their status during their time in the United States.
Sessions ruled that the SEVIS claim will be judged separately from the ongoing habeas corpus case challenging Öztürk’s arrest and detention as a violation of the First Amendment. On May 23, Öztürk’s attorneys filed a motion for the government to restore her SEVIS record, which has remained inactive following her release on bail from ICE custody on May 9.
Öztürk’s attorneys argued in the May 23 motion that — between March and May — various courts have restored many students’ SEVIS status through preliminary injunctive relief against terminations of their records. The SEVIS records that were subsequently restored were done so on grounds that ICE arbitrarily and unlawfully terminated the records without notice.
They also argued that Öztürk would likely suffer without a restored record, saying that she would “lose the opportunity for employment, including teaching, and will therefore lose a source of financial support.”
The federal government replied to the motion on June 2, arguing for a dismissal of the SEVIS claim for improper venue on the grounds that since neither Öztürk nor her attorneys live in Vermont, the SEVIS motion could not be considered in Vermont by Sessions. They argued that the SEVIS claim was out of the scope of the habeas corpus petition and that the Immigration and Nationality Act denied the Vermont court’s ability to consider the SEVIS motion.
They also insisted that ICE had a rational reason to terminate her SEVIS record, since her visa had been revoked by the State Department and that removal proceedings had been opened.
Sessions explained in the order that he had to either dismiss the claim or transfer it to a more appropriate venue.
“The Court finds that transfer of Ms. Ozturk’s SEVIS-related claims back to Massachusetts would almost certainly be a faster route to timely resolution than requiring her to refile her claims,” he wrote. “Dismissal on the other hand would penalize a justice-defeating technicality.”
