A federal judge in Vermont questioned on Monday whether the Trump administration would instigate a "constitutional crisis" by not releasing a Turkish student at Tufts University from immigration custody if he concluded her arrest was unlawful.
U.S. District Judge William Sessions raised that prospect during a hearing in Burlington as he suggested he may order authorities to move Rumeysa Ozturk from the Louisiana detention center she has been in for nearly three weeks back to Vermont, where she was briefly held after her arrest last month.
The judge heard arguments in the case after a federal judge in Massachusetts transferred the 30-year-old's lawsuit challenging her detention to Vermont rather than dismiss it or send it to Louisiana as the U.S. Justice Department wanted.