US judge rules Milwaukee mosque leader Salah Sarsour can be deported
Immigration Judge Jayme Salinardi has ruled that Palestinian-born Islamic Society of Milwaukee president Salah Sarsour can be removed from the US on foreign policy grounds, leaning on a 2025 Marco Rubio memo — while rejecting claims he lied on his green card application.
A US immigration judge has ruled that the leader of Wisconsin’s largest mosque can be deported, resting in part on a Trump administration memo declaring him a foreign policy threat.
Immigration Judge Jayme Salinardi ruled on Wednesday that Palestinian-born Salah Sarsour, president of the Islamic Society of Milwaukee, is removable from the United States based in part on a memo by Secretary of State Marco Rubio that “his actions undermine US foreign policy to combat antisemitism around the world”, according to his lawyers (Al Jazeera).
Sarsour called the ruling “deeply disappointing”. “I will continue fighting to defend the right to free speech and to stay in the country I have called home for more than three decades,” he told the Associated Press (AP).
The case turns on Rubio’s June 2025 memo invoking a rarely used law allowing the Secretary of State to seek the deportation of non-citizens whose presence could have “potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences” — the same provision used against pro-Palestinian activists Mahmoud Khalil and Mohsen Mahdawi (Heartland Post). Taurel criticised the judge’s “extreme deference” to Rubio’s memo, saying Salinardi felt bound by an earlier Khalil ruling: “If the Secretary of State says the person is deportable, it is game over.” Salinardi did, however, reject the government’s allegation that Sarsour had lied on his green card application.
The ruling does not mean immediate deportation. Sarsour’s lawyers have 60 days to argue that removal would put him at risk of torture, which could protect him under the Convention Against Torture; if they lose, they plan to appeal, and Taurel said Sarsour cannot be deported while that appeal is pending (New Indian Express).
Sarsour was detained by ICE in March and released in June after 81 days, when a federal judge found a “substantial” case of retaliation for his Palestinian-rights advocacy. The government has cited decades-old convictions in Israel: a 1988 imprisonment after confessing to throwing stones and a Molotov cocktail at military personnel, and a 1995 conviction over an attempt to hold weapons. Sarsour denies the offences and his lawyers say the confessions were forced through torture; he has no US criminal record.
Sarsour has said deportation to the occupied West Bank “means the end of my life”. The judge also named Jordan as a possible destination, though his lawyers say he is not a Jordanian citizen (Washington Examiner).
Sources
- https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/9/30/us-judge-rules-wisconsin-mosque-leader-salah-sarsour-can-be-deported
- https://www.akronnewsreporter.com/2026/09/30/wisconsin-mosque-leader-judge-deportation/
- https://heartlandpost.com/immigration-judge-clears-way-for-deportation-of-milwaukee-islamic-society-leader/
- https://www.newindianexpress.com/amp/story/world/2026/Sep/30/us-can-deport-leader-of-wisconsins-largest-mosque-on-foreign-policy-grounds-judge-rules
- https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/immigration/4748450/judge-deport-wisconsin-mosque-leader-national-security-grounds-no-criminal-record/
- https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/us/palestinian-born-us-mosque-leader-faces-deportation-after-judge-rules-he-is-foreign-policy-threat/articleshow/134596807.cms
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