Tufts University graduate student Rümeysa Öztürk said in an op-ed published Thursday that her abrupt arrest and detention by immigration agents was “a narrative of human suffering.”
Writing for the Tufts Daily student newspaper, Öztürk described the conditions of her six-week detention at an immigration facility in Louisiana as unsanitary and inhumane.
But the experience bonded her with the other women detainees, who were compassionate and strong “even when the circumstances were unimaginably challenging,” she said.
“All we wanted was to be seen as human again,” she wrote. “We felt invisible, stripped of our identity as breathing and living human beings.”
Öztürk was seized by immigration agents in Somerville on March 25. Federal officials said the basis of her arrest was an op-ed she co-wrote for the Tufts Daily in March 2024, which criticized the university’s stance on the Israel-Hamas war.
A career immigration official testified in federal court Tuesday that his Immigration and Customs Enforcement supervisors had instructed him to prioritize her arrest, the first time he had ever received such a directive.
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In the op-ed, Öztürk described her fear as she was “suddenly surrounded and grabbed by a swarm of masked individuals,” handcuffed, and shoved into an unmarked car.
“Thousands of questions crept up in the hours that passed,” she wrote. “Who were these people? Had I been a good enough person if today was my final day? I was relieved to have finished filing my taxes, but I couldn’t shake the thought of a book I needed to return to the library. I regretted not calling my grandparents and friends that day. My mom had heard my scream on the phone when they were taking me.”
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Over the next few days, she was transferred to several immigration facilities in New England, Georgia, and finally, an all-women’s facility in Basile, La., she recounted.
Öztürk described the difficult living conditions, trying to sleep in the same “freezing” cell with 23 other women, under constant fluorescent lighting. She said random headcounts were often conducted in the early hours of the morning.
“For the first time in my life, I realized that sleep — real sleep — is actually a luxury,” she wrote.
She said her asthma was exacerbated by the “damp, dusty, and overcrowded” conditions, and described crying for help when she had a “severe asthma attack.” She said officers did not respond until women began banging on the windows to get their attention.
Öztürk said she struggled to celebrate the end of Ramadan. She said that a Catholic detainee told her “even God cannot hear us here,” although the woman prayed night and day just the same.
“I asked her if it was God who could not hear us, or if it was people like me before this experience, who either know nothing about the immigration detention system or prefer to ignore or forget about it,” Öztürk wrote.
But Öztürk said that the women in the facility formed a solidarity, “providing shoulders to cry on, prayers to cling to, and hugs filled with compassion.”
Detainees included immigrants from countries such as Colombia, Armenia, Afghanistan, and elsewhere, Öztürk said. Among their ranks were a Pilates instructor, a visual arts teacher, a professional violinist, and a singer with “almost a million” social media followers.
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“Many women wept day and night, longing for their families,” she wrote. “My friends showed me letters from their young children, accompanied by sweet photos of them and mischievous pictures of their pets. Some of the children are in their home countries; some are waiting in different states with other caregivers; and others have been taken into the foster care system. I learned that women have even been separated from their babies after giving birth.”
Öztürk was ordered released by a Vermont judge on May 9, who noted that she had no criminal record and said her continued detention was steadily worsening her asthma.
She returned to Massachusetts the next day and has said she plans to continue her doctoral work at Tufts, focusing on child development, as she challenges her deportation in court.
In the op-ed, she said she left a letter for the other women in the facility under her bed, thanking them for their compassion.
“I learned from them that even in the most inhumane conditions, human dignity cannot be stripped away from human beings unless they decide to give up,” she wrote. “I learned from these strong women what solidarity looks like.”
Camilo Fonseca can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on X @fonseca_esq and on Instagram @camilo_fonseca.reports.