Held By ICE, NJ Woman Sleeps On Concrete Floor As Lawmakers Demand Her Release

PASSAIC COUNTY, NJ — Lawmakers and advocates in both Texas and New Jersey are demanding the release of Leqaa Kordia, a 33-year-old Palestinian woman and Paterson resident who is being held by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

Kordia, who has not been convicted of a crime, is currently being held in the Prairieland Detention Center in Alvarado, Texas. She was arrested by ICE in Newark this past March.

Six New Jersey lawmakers, including Andy Kim and Cory Booker, along with 34 Texas legislators, have signed letters to U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem requesting Kordia’s release.

“Since being detained in March 2025, Ms. Kordia attested to horrific conditions of her detention, including severe overcrowding that has forced her to sleep on a concrete floor, among roaches and other bugs,” the NJ letter reads. “Rather than subjecting her to these horrific conditions, ICE should reserve detention for people who pose threats to public safety or national security and should immediately release Ms. Kordia so that she can seek relief from removal from her home in New Jersey.”

Kordia came to the United States in 2016 on a B-2 tourist visa, later getting a F-1 student visa to enroll in English classes. She soon began the lengthy process of gaining her Lawful Permanent Residence status.

Later, Kordia was unintentionally misled by a “trusted teacher and mentor” who told her that beginning the lawful permanent residency process meant that she had gained legal status, which is not the case.

In 2022, she withdrew from the English classes, thereby forfeiting her F-1 student visa and, unknowingly, her status as a legal immigrant.

According to the letters, a 2024 incident during a Gaza Ceasefire protest outside New York’s Columbia University is what put Kordia on the Department of Homeland Security’s map. The NYPD arrested Kordia as they were trying to disperse the crowd, and she was released a day later, with all charges dropped.

It was less than a year later, on March 13, when the DHS told Kordia that there was an issue with her immigration status and she’d need to come to the Newark office to handle it. She complied and was arrested by agents.

She was soon taken to the Prairieland Detention Center, where she has been held for more than six months.

Kordia’s case has been reviewed by judges twice, and each time it has been concluded that she is not a danger to the public, that her arrest was unconstitutional, and that she should be released. The DHS has also conceded that Kordia should be released.

However, after both rulings, ICE immediately asked the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) to allow for a “discretionary stay,” keeping her confined until the appeals are finalized, lawmakers said.

In her time at Prairieland, Kordia has been forced to sleep on dirty concrete floors, has lost more than 50 pounds, has been denied religious accommodations as a Muslim woman, has been fed “inadequate and inedible” food, and more.

“The federal administration’s ongoing and shameful confinement of Leqaa is part of its broader crackdown on freedom of expression and its criminalization of peaceful protest, undermining the protections of the U.S. Constitution to advance their own authoritarian political agenda. This cannot continue,” the Texas letter reads. “Leqaa Kordia… deserves her freedom, and a chance to reunite with her family.”

Paterson officials have also stepped in, passing a resolution that calls for Kordia's immediate release. The resolution, sponsored by councilmen Luis Velez and Ibrahim Omar, was passed in December.

Nobel Prize-winning civil rights advocacy group Amnesty International USA has also been pushing for the release of Kordia.

The organization has created an open letter for anyone to sign, directed at Noem, demanding the release of Kordia.

See the default letter, which can be edited by the signer, below:

To Secretary Noem:
cc: my members of Congress

I am writing to you as a supporter of human rights on behalf of Amnesty International about Leqaa Kordia. On March 13, 2025, Ms. Kordia, a 33-year-old Muslim Palestinian woman, voluntarily met with Department of Homeland Security agents after she learned she was being investigated by immigration authorities. She was immediately detained and transferred from New Jersey to Prairieland Detention Facility in Texas, far from her family and immigration attorney.

Ms. Kordia was in the process of obtaining legal permanent residency in the USA. She came to the attention of immigration authorities after her arrest at a protest in 2024 outside of Columbia University against Israel’s ongoing genocide against Palestinians in the occupied Gaza Strip. The charges were later dismissed in the interests of justice.

Ms. Kordia’s arrest and ongoing arbitrary detention are a part of the continued attacks on human rights by the Trump administration. Targeting peaceful protesters and threatening their immigration status for the content of their protest, such as advocating for the human rights of Palestinians, is a violation of the rights to freedom of expression and assembly. This targeting sends a chilling message to people across the country that anyone exercising their human rights will be subject to repression, detention, and possible deportation. For immigrant communities already living in fear throughout the U.S., they are now only further pushed into the shadows with fear that they could be deported for speaking out.

Leqaa Kordia has suffered violations of her rights to practice her religion while detained in Texas. She poses no threat to the public or flight risk and is a caregiver for family members in New Jersey. She should be released immediately to her family.