A New York federal court judge ordered Monday that recent Columbia University graduate Mahmoud Khalil cannot be deported from the United States until a further court order.

“To preserve the Court’s jurisdiction pending a ruling on the petition, Petitioner shall not be removed from the United States unless and until the Court orders otherwise,” wrote Jesse M. Furman, a district court judge in Manhattan in a court order filed late Monday afternoon. The order also set a conference for attorneys on March 12.

Khalil’s attorney Amy Greer had filed a motion opposing his detention on Sunday and attorneys with the Center for Constitutional Rights and Creating Law Enforcement Accountability and Responsibility project at the City University of New York School of Law were expected to file a motion on Monday demanding Khalil’s release.

During the campus protests that roiled Columbia University over Israel’s war on Gaza, Khalil served as a negotiator and mediator between school administrators and student protesters. A permanent U.S. resident expecting his first child, he graduated in December from Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs.

Khalil was taken from his New York apartment Saturday evening by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents. He is being held without any criminal charges at the LaSalle Detention Facility in Jena, Louisiana, a private jail operated by the GEO Group, according to the ICE detainee tracker. For the first 24 hours of his detention, Khalil’s attorneys and family were in the dark about his whereabouts.

When ICE agents showed up at Khalil’s home on Saturday, they claimed his student visa had been revoked, said his attorney Amy Greer, who filed an initial petition challenging his........

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