By Albert Chang-Yoo
On the evening of March 26, Tufts University student Rümeysa Öztürk was walking outside her apartment, getting ready to break her Ramadan fast with friends. Without warning, she was approached by multiple masked, plainclothes ICE officers and apprehended. Since then Öztürk, a Turkish PhD student and Fulbright scholar on a legal student visa, has been held in a Louisiana detention center. In defending the arrest, Secretary of State Marco Rubio labeled Öztürk as a “terrorist sympathizer” and a national security threat.
By all accounts, Öztürk was not an involved activist at Tufts. Rather, her deportable offense was to co-author an opinion piece calling for divestment from Israel in the Tufts Daily, the campus’ student newspaper. “Credible accusations against Israel include accounts of deliberate starvation and indiscriminate slaughter of Palestinian civilians and plausible genocide,” the article states.
It cannot be overstated that nobody, regardless of belief, should be arrested for simply expressing their opinion. Yet since coming to power, the Trump administration has taken an even more heavy-handed approach on the first amendment by systematically targeting colleges and universities across America. He has chosen to pick on the most vulnerable: immigrant workers, international students, and so-called “DEI hires”. The walls are closing in on those who can speak truth to power at a time when they are needed more than ever.
Student journalists have and must continue to report on these issues, even though these stories are being buried under the constant barrage of headlines. The Öztürk story, one of dozens, was washed away in the 24-hour mainstream news cycle as outlets raced to cover yet another story. CNN, CBS, and the New York Times soon began to cover Trump’s concerning claims that he wasn’t ruling out a third term. However, the University paper, Tufts Daily, continues to cover Öztürk’s plight.
Over the past four years, I have written over two dozen articles for The Trail. When I first started writing, The Trail had been out of print for nearly two years. It has since grown thanks to the many dedicated student journalists who have contributed to telling the story of the University of Puget Sound and its surrounding community. During my time here, through post-COVID budget problems to the pro-Palestinian protests, The Trail has continued to diligently report on the ways national issues materialize here on campus.
The current climate has made it clear that the work and voice of student media is gravely important. Looking to the past is a helpful reminder that student journalism has always been there to document history. Every issue of The Trail is saved in the University’s archives, serving as a testament to a moment in time, from Vietnam War protests to student-led rallies after the Rodney King verdict. These moments would be lost to time without the diligent work of our team of writers and editors. The Trail is a unique institution on campus, made even more rare because it operates under full student editorial control.
If the perils at Harvard or Columbia University seem too distant, it might be worth remembering that not even the liberal bastion of the Pacific Northwest is safe. The Trump administration has already revoked the student visas of at least 15 international students attending Washington universities. And, in early March, the Trump administration sent a letter to Pacific Lutheran University, Whitman College, Eastern Washington University, and University of Washington: Seattle warning of federal enforcement if schools fail to prevent antisemitism. Looking past the notion that this warning is predicated on the assumption that protesting in support of Palestine is inherently antisemitic, it should be noted that Pacific Lutheran University told the Tacoma News Tribune there had only been one student-filed complaint relating to antisemitism in the past year.
Furthermore, our University’s hometown is becoming the center of Trump’s immigration strategy in Washington State thanks to the Northwest ICE Processing Center located at the Port of Tacoma. The ICE Processing Center has a long history of mismanagement, including a 2008 report by Seattle University’s Law School which found that conditions at the facility “violate both international human rights law and domestic Constitutional protections.” In 2024, two people died while in detention. Within just the past two months, local ICE officials have detained a local farmworker union leader and activist, a 64-year old UW lab technician and green card holder, and a young British backpacker. None of them are cartel members, transnational terrorists, or public security threats.
It’s a critical moment in higher education. The Trump administration has made clear that dissent will not be tolerated. The University of Puget Sound, small as it is, does not exist within a vacuum. It’s incredibly important that the voice of students at this University–however that may manifest–is listened to.
Student media is vital to this effort. Student journalism, in particular, has the power to spotlight important, community-level issues. In many ways, this can have more of an impact than any story published by corporate media. I’m incredibly proud of the work that the team has done, and know that when provided with the necessary financial and administrative support, The Trail will meet the moment.