Columbia Activist Mohsen Mahdawi Released on Bail

Mohsen Mahdawi, one of the leaders of the anti-Israel protests at Columbia University was ordered released on bail by a Vermont judge today.

In ruling to release Mr. Mahdawi on bail, Judge Geoffrey W. Crawford of Federal District Court in Vermont found on Wednesday that he did not pose a danger to the public and that he was not a flight risk. The judge drew parallels between the current political climate and McCarthyism, saying it was “not our proudest moment.”…

Mr. Mahdawi, 34, had been in custody since April 14, when immigration officials detained him at an appointment in Vermont that he thought was a step toward becoming a U.S. citizen. Judge Crawford ordered that Mr. Mahdawi be released from the detention facility where he had been held in the state.

In granting the release of Mr. Mahdawi, a Vermont resident, Judge Crawford cited his extensive ties to his community. He noted that the court had received more than 90 submissions from community members, academic experts and professors who know Mr. Mahdawi, “many of them Jewish,” attesting to his character and consistently describing him as “peaceful.”

After he walked out of the courthouse he gave a speech about peace.

“They arrested me. What’s the reason? Because I raised my voice, and I said no to war, yes to peace,” Mr. Mahdawi said. “Because I said, ‘Enough is enough. Killing more than 50,000 Palestinians is more than enough.’ ”

As always, the fact that half of those dead Palestinians were Hamas fighters, a designated terrorist group, never gets a mention from Mahdawi. He also had a message for President Trump.

“I am saying it clear and loud to President Trump and his Cabinet: I am not afraid of you,” Mahdawi said Wednesday outside the Vermont courthouse after his release.

The government filed sealed documents undermining the claim that Mahdawi is all about peace but he denied them in court.

In the government’s opposition to releasing Mahdawi, it said that law enforcement records indicated that Mahdawi has admitted “to being involved in and supporting antisemitic acts of violence” and “an interest in and facility with firearms for that purpose,” according to court documents reviewed by NBC News.

The government included two exhibits with their filing, which have been filed under seal. One of the exhibits, which NBC News has reviewed, is a 2015 report from the Windsor Police Department in Vermont, where a gun shop owner told officers that Mahdawi “supposedly told” the owner that he used to build machine guns “to kill Jews while he was in Palestine.”

In his declaration, Mahdawi said that he recalled visiting a gun shop in Windsor, Vermont, but that he is “absolutely certain that I never expressed the words the report falsely attributes to me, in that exchange or ever.”

“I am a peaceful person, and would never express wanting to harm or kill anyone,” he wrote.

Obviously, 2015 is a long time ago, long before the current controversy over protests at Columbia. In fact, this would have been during the Obama administration when he was 24-years-old. He admits he was there but denies saying anything about killing Jews. Is the theory that this gun shop owner made that up and then made a false report to the police because…why? I guess anything’s possible these days but I’d like to hear more before just discounting this. Also, what’s the other exhibit filed under seal?

Here’s the scene outside the courthouse.

BREAKING: A judge just ordered pro-Palestine Columbia student Mohsen Mahdawi freed weeks after armed Trump DHS agents detained him at his Vermont naturalization interview. pic.twitter.com/OMgOyuapoy

— Brian Krassenstein (@krassenstein) April 30, 2025

And here’s a bit of Mahdawi’s speech. The big applause line is the one aimed at Trump. He clearly knows his audience.

“To President Trump and his Cabinet: I am not afraid of you.”

— Palestinian Columbia student Mohsen Mahdawi after being freed from ICE custody by a Vermont judge pic.twitter.com/XFexSoXwY9

— The Recount (@therecount) April 30, 2025