Cornell Grad Student Who Attended Pro-Palestine Protest Could Be Forced to Leave U.S.

For the past year, Cornell University PhD student Momodou Taal, 30, has taken part in various pro-Palestine demonstrations on campus, with many calling for the school to divest from weapons manufacturers selling products to Israel during its bombardment of Gaza (and now Lebanon). But unlike thousands who have supported such grassroots actions in public spaces across the U.S., Taal now faces the prospect of being expelled from the country for it.

“They want to make an example out of me, to then crush any other students thinking about being advocate for Palestine, or advocating for divestment from genocide,” Taal, a Gambian-born U.K. citizen who currently faces a potential academic suspension over his presence at a Sept. 18 protest, tells Rolling Stone. Such a disciplinary action would also cost him his F-1 student visa, effectively forcing him to immediately self-deport if he is unable to obtain a tourist visa. This is a grim prospect that Taal and other international student activists in the U.S. have faced since campus protests erupted in the spring to denounce Israel‘s war in Gaza, advocate for a ceasefire, and push institutions to cut ties with military contractors. And while none, it appears, have been expelled from the country like this, certain politicians have endorsed such an approach, none more so than former president Donald Trump, who has vowed to deport foreign students he characterizes as “pro-Hamas radicals.” (The vast majority of campus protesters are U.S. citizens.)

Taal is in the third year of his PhD program in Africana Studies, where he works on issues around sovereignty in West Africa. He also teaches an undergraduate freshman writing seminar called “What Is Blackness?” and hosts the independent podcast The Malcolm Effect, where he has interviewed prominent academics including Cornel West, Charisse Burden-Stelly, and Vijay Prashad on questions of politics and race that originate with the revolutionary thought of Malcolm X.

On both the podcast and X (formerly Twitter), Taal has criticized Israel’s military actions in no uncertain terms. And, while he does not occupy a leadership position in any of the campus groups mobilizing in support of Palestine, he has often spoken at their events — which he believes created an impression among Cornell administrators and the Cornell University Police Department that he is a primary organizer in the movement. CUPD did not respond to a request for comment on this claim, while a university administrator said that federal law prohibits them from sharing this type of “student-specific information.”

On Sept. 18, Taal attended a campus demonstration of roughly “150 protesters,” at which he spoke for “maybe a minute or two,” he says. Held by the Coalition for Mutual Liberation, a group advocating for Cornell to “divest from genocide and apartheid in Palestine,” it was staged outside the university’s Statler Hotel while a job fair was being held inside. CML was protesting the event because it featured recruiters from weapons manufacturers Boeing and L3Harris, two suppliers to the Israeli military. Eventually, demonstrators moved past CUPD officers to enter the building and went into a second-floor ballroom where the job fair was being held. They were reportedly noisy and disruptive enough that after 20 minutes, the fair was prematurely shut down.

Taal says he made it into the ballroom but left the premises after spending just “five minutes” inside the hotel, returning to the outdoor rally spot. He says that as he departed, however, he encountered CUPD chief Anthony Bellamy, who “stopped in his tracks” upon evidently recognizing Taal. “[He] stares me down, then continues to walk past me,” Taal recalls. “Next morning, I receive an email from him directly, telling me he has reported me.” (Chief Bellamy’s office did not immediately return a request for comment.)

That formal complaint from CUPD, which has been reviewed by Rolling Stone, went to the Office of Student Conduct and Community Standards (OSCCS). It alleged that Taal had violated the university’s Student Code of Conduct at the protest because he “repeatedly failed to comply” with university officials’ orders to back away from both the Statler Hotel and the entrance to the ballroom; that he made “unauthorized use of university property” by entering the hotel “behind individuals who had used force to gain entry”; and that he “intentionally led or repeated chants that were unreasonably loud,” disrupting the fair. Taal tells Rolling Stone that he did participate in chants but brought no item for creating additional noise, as some activists did.

Joel M. Malina, Vice President of University Relations, issued a statement the evening of Sept. 18, alleging that “officers were pushed and shoved” during the incident. He noted that CUPD was working to identify students who violated university policies, and that any of them would be subject to “immediate action including suspension.”

In response to the police complaint, OSCCS served Taal with paperwork, also reviewed by Rolling Stone, that explained he would be temporarily suspended from Cornell and receive a persona non grata notification prohibiting him from “entering any part of Cornell University Campuses.” The OSCCS letter, like Malina, described the Sept. 18 protest participants using “physical force to push past” police officers and enter the hotel, and again to enter the ballroom where the job fair was underway. Of the confrontation at the entrance of the hotel, Taal says he did not see any shoving. “From my perspective, it seems the police moved out of the way,” he says. “I did not push any police officers.” Reporters on the scene for student newspaper the Cornell Sun likewise did not observe physical violence toward any officers.

Taal says he is not aware of any other students among the dozens at the CML action currently up for suspension. The university did not respond to the question of whether anyone else was facing disciplinary action, while CUPD did not respond to indicate whether it had brought any complaint about the Sept. 18 protesters besides the one against Taal.

“What we have seen from the campus is that they weaponize and instrumentalize suspensions in a very critically charged way,” Taal claims. “I think due to my visibility and due to my precarity, I’m being targeted.” He believes so in part because back in April, he was one of just four students threatened with suspension over involvement in a pro-Palestine encampment organized by CML with hundreds of participants. One of the other three, he adds, was also an international student. In that case, university ultimately offered a compromise: stop facilitating the encampment and temporarily stay off campus to retain active student status. Taal had already planned travel to the U.K. at the time, and CML removed the encampment voluntarily in May, so the deal worked out. The two other suspended students whose names are public remained enrolled as well.

Now, with two years left in a PhD program he began in the fall of 2022, Taal is in a potentially far worse situation: at a Monday meeting, he says that Christina Liang, Senior Associate Dean of Students and Director of the OSCCS, informed him his suspension, or withdrawal, would become official on Tuesday or Wednesday. He has yet to receive such an update, though an email from Cornell’s Senior Immigration Advisor to Taal, reviewed by Rolling Stone, explained that he would lose F-1 visa status once this happened, with “no grace period” for departure from the U.S. Liang did not return a request for comment on the pending disciplinary action against Taal, and did not immediately respond to a follow-up request.

A request for comment from CUPD, meanwhile, was answered by a Cornell University media relations representative, who relayed a statement from Malina: “Universities are required by federal regulation to terminate the F-1 status for any student who is not permitted to be enrolled due to a disciplinary action,” the vice president said. “Any international student administratively withdrawn by Cornell pursuant to the Student Code of Conduct is urged to immediately review immigration guidelines and consult with experts. Universities can disallow enrollment and bar a student from campus, but do not have deportation powers.”

The media rep also referred to a Monday statement from Michael I. Kotlikoff, Cornell’s Interim President, who said that the job fair protesters had displayed “intentionally menacing behavior” and “forcibly entered the hotel.” Their entry into the ballroom, he claimed, knocked off “an officer’s body-worn camera,” while the group’s use of bullhorns, cymbals, pots, and pans resulted “in medical complaints of potential hearing loss.” He clarified that individuals would “face immediate suspension or employment sanctions up to and including dismissal.”

As seemingly the lone individual selected for such consequences, Taal has become a cause in himself by spreading word of his possible de facto deportation on social media. “The process requires due process and investigation for any discipline issue, but they’re circumventing and subverting their own processes,” he says. As of Wednesday, he says, more than 4,000 people have signed an open letter hosted on Google Docs titled “We Demand the Reinstatement of Momodou Taal.” The text accuses Cornell of “procedural problems” in the application and enforcement of suspensions. “Unless we stand up to the university, it is entirely plausible that at any moment, Momodou will have less than 48 hours notice to book a flight, pack up all of his belongings, and get out of the country,” it reads.

Temporarily suspended students, according to Cornell’s policy, may file a written request to lift the suspension, to be reviewed by a panel of “one student, one faculty, and one nonfaculty member” of the University Hearing and Review Board within five business days. This panel has the authority to reverse the disciplinary action.

Academics, including Taal’s past podcast guest Burden-Stelly and human rights lawyer Noura Erakat, have rallied behind him, and a number of signatories on the letter include his undergraduate students, who have written about his talents as an educator and argued that he is being unfairly singled out among other pro-Palestine demonstrators. Cornell students on Wednesday held a rally demanding his reinstatement, and on Thursday, the Cornell Chapter of the American Association of University Professors published a column in the Cornell Sun demanding Taal’s reinstatement, calling his suspension “unjustified” in light of “the lack of evidence of violence, threat of violence or threat to health or safety.”

Taal tweeted in an update on Wednesday of the university administration’s “change in tone” in its latest communication. “I have been informed by the university that no change will be made to my visa status and my F-1 visa remains open until the appeal process has been exhausted.” Of course, this could amount to a mere delay of the inevitable, as a failed appeal of the suspension would force him out of the U.S. just the same. “Please keep up the pressure,” he told his supporters. Then, on Thursday, Taal announced that his initial appeal of the suspension had been rejected by Ryan Lombardi, Vice President of Student and Campus Life, within a day — though he still had not received official confirmation of the disciplinary action against him, nor had his case referred to a full review panel.

“I have until 5 p.m. [Friday] to appeal to the provost,” Taal explained in a tweet. “If the provost rejects this appeal, then I believe my withdrawal will be processed and I will promptly have to leave the country.” He again decried the administration’s failure to investigate the case or allow him a chance to respond to the allegations. “I maintain that all my actions have been peaceful and in accordance with my First Amendment rights,” he wrote. “This is a deliberate targeting of a Black Muslim student at an institution where those two identities are increasingly unwelcome.”

Taal tells Rolling Stone he is considering his options in a worst-case scenario, and he has retained the services of an immigration lawyer. His attorney, Eric Lee, released a statement Thursday noting that the Cornell administration had been incorrect when it told Taal he should be prepared to leave the country as soon as the weekend, since universities do not have to inform the Department of Homeland Security of a suspension until several weeks later. Lee also said the university had made the choice “to persecute Mr. Taal for free speech activity knowing full well that doing so will subject him to serious immigration consequences.”

Should Taal ultimately have to flee the U.S., he has no settled idea of what he’d do. “It’s definitely a possibility,” he says. “So I’m thinking about that.”