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has said that the government will who support Hamas and came to the U.S. as students “with an intent rile up all kinds of anti-Jewish student, antisemitic activities,” referencing the Palestinian rights protests at universities in 2024.

“And if you end up having a green card — not citizenship, but a green card — as a result of that visa while you’re here and those activities, we’re going to kick you out. It’s as simple as that. This is not about free speech. to be in the United States to begin with,” .

That policy has now ensnared Mahmoud Khalil, a recent graduate of Columbia University and a leader in the Palestinian rights protest movement at the school. Khalil, a Palestinian who was born in Syria, after he was , in New York City. The that the secretary of state had determined Khalil’s presence or activities in the country posed “serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States.”

Khalil, a Palestinian who was born in Syria, . In 2024, he received a green card and became a lawful permanent resident — meaning he has the legal right to work and stay in the U.S. There are an lawful permanent residents in the country.

Khalil’s lawyers say that his arrest and pending deportation .

In many respects, the rights of lawful permanent residents and citizens are similar. Yet citizens and lawful permanent residents do not enjoy equal status under the law.

The Supreme Court and other courts recognize that to free speech.

Yet the Supreme Court in the 1950s based on their political activity, in particular membership in the .

So, while lawful permanent residents may not be criminally prosecuted for their political speech or activity, what they say or write may well affect their ability to remain in the U.S., if the government determines that they are a security risk.

I’m a scholar of . Here are three major differences between the rights of citizens and lawful permanent residents.

1. Limited political rights

Lawful permanent residents are people born in other countries who can legally work and live in the U.S. for as long as they like. They may enlist in the U.S. armed forces, apply to become U.S. citizens, and are legally protected against discrimination by .

States also generally cannot discriminate against lawful permanent residents — though states may require certain groups of people, such as or , to have U.S. citizenship.

Between 1820 and 1920, noncitizens routinely , including voting, holding office and jury service in many states and territories.

These days, states and the federal government generally allow only citizens to , hold political positions and vote. With a few exceptions, such as voting in some local elections, permanent residents are not able to do any of these things.

2. Limited public benefits

The distinction between noncitizens and citizens extends to other areas of life, such as public benefits.

The Supreme Court has , “In the exercise of its broad power over naturalization and immigration, Congress regularly makes rules that would be unacceptable if applied to citizens.”

In practice, this means that the federal government — and to a much lesser extent, states — do not , such as Medicaid and other kinds of government support, to lawful permanent residents and other noncitizens on the same basis as citizens.

For example, lawful permanent residents must generally wait five years before becoming eligible for certain programs intended to support low-income people, such as and the .

3. Reversal of immigration status

Finally, unlike citizens, lawful permanent residents can lose their legal immigration status.

Congress has enacted many grounds for , or stopping them from .

Some courts have found that the U.S. government can deport a lawful permanent resident or terrorism concerns, even if the person has not committed a crime.

that they can deport lawful permanent residents like Khalil under , which states that a lawful permanent resident can be deported if the secretary of state has reasonable ground to believe that this person “would have potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States.”

The Trump administration had initiated deportation proceedings against Khalil on this ground.

that any non-citizen can be deported if the secretary of state and the attorney general jointly determine that the person is associated with terrorism, or poses a threat to the U.S. In addition, the law says an immigrant can be deported if they “endorse or espouse ” to endorse or espouse terrorist activity or support a terrorist organization.

Still, lawful permanent residents are entitled to certain basic rights, such as retaining a lawyer to represent them in before they are deported.

By contrast, the U.S. government cannot deport a U.S. citizen . However, sometimes U.S. citizens are .

Indeed, the Supreme Court has found that while it is constitutional to execute a military member for desertion in wartime, it would be to deprive them of citizenship.

Legal grounds for deporting noncitizens

There have been few recent court cases testing the scope of deporting lawful permanent residents on national security grounds based on pure speech.

In 1999, that if a person is deportable, they are deportable — even if there is some other reason that motivated the government’s deportation proceedings, such as a suspicion that the non-citizen is involved with crime or terrorism.

The that the government could deport non-citizens for technical visa violations, even if the case was based on the government’s belief that the non-citizens were associated with a terrorist group.

There is also some precedent arguing that deportation based on “adverse foreign policy consequences” is too broad and nonspecific to be constitutional.

Indeed, Marianne Trump Barry, the sister of the president, when she was a federal judge in the mid-1990s. But Samuel Alito, then an appeals court judge, in 1996.

For its part, the Supreme Court has occasionally held that very broad and indeterminate deportation grounds are “,” meaning so sweeping and imprecise that they are unconstitutional.

Khalil’s lawyers appeared with U.S. government lawyers on March 12. Their goal: to get Khalil moved from internment in Louisiana back to internment in New York. But that may well be just the beginning of a long haul for the Palestinian student. Courts have proved reluctant to second-guess security grounds rationales in immigration cases. For these reasons, cases like Khalil’s may go on for years.

, Professor of Criminal Law, Immigration, and Race and Law,

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