“Who keeps us safe? We keep us safe.”

This line was among the chants shouted by the thousands of people gathered in Somerville to support Tufts graduate student Rümeysa Öztürk in late March after she was abducted and set for deportation at the direction of the U.S. Secretary of State in what has by now become an international drama.

The call from the protesters may have been more than a simple rallying chant, however, and more likely one of the few strategies that citizens and politicians alike can employ to defend Constitutional and immigration rights, especially as Congress is controlled by lawmakers aligned with the Trump Administration, say lawyers, local lawmakers and activists.

“We need a number of things, but first and foremost, we need public pressure,” said Massachusetts State Rep. Erika Uyterhoeven, whose district includes the city of Somerville, in a recent interview with the Sampan. “The singular ask that we’ve heard from everyone in a position of power who is aligned with us, is that we have to keep the public pressure on.”

That message has been repeated by some immigration attorneys and activists who see obstacles ahead from a Republican-led Congress and a number of federal courts with judges who were installed by the first Trump administration.

“Our appeal is to the population. We will do everything that we possibly can to defend democracy in the courts. But the real defense of democracy has to come from the people,” said Eric Lee in an interview with CNN recently, speaking about other related immigration cases. Lee, of Diamante Law, made a similar appeal in a Sampan interview just after the presidential election, when he said, “Americans are going to have to be ready to stand up and defend their neighbors, their coworkers, their families, their fellow students, wherever they may be, and from whatever walk of life.”

State Sen. Pat Jehlen, however, during the City Hall rally on April 1, stressed the need to keep up the protests for them to be effective.

That thousands were willing to rally at Powder House Square in Somerville on March 26, just 24 hours after the detention of Öztürk, and again days later in front of Boston City Hall, are perhaps early signs that people are willing to stand up for the rights of immigrants, the First Amendment, and due process and against presidential abuses of power. During the 90-minute rally in Somerville, the entirety of Nathan Tufts Park was filled with people chanting, listening to speakers, and holding signs.

Some people wore Palestinian head scarfs, or keffiyehs, wrapped around their shoulders or faces, some wore kippahs on their heads, while others were masked. Chalked signs on the ground read “ICE not welcome in Boston.”

Öztürk, 30, is a Turkish national and has been at Tufts University studying for a doctorate in childhood development. She’s also a Fulbright Scholar. The international student was taken by agents of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) arm of the Department of Homeland Security on the street while on her way to break her Ramadan fast with friends.

No charges had been filed against her by the Trump Administration at the time this article was written. The Trump Administration says it revoked her F-1 visa on March 21 but according to Oztürk’s lawyers in a petition filed with the Massachusetts District Court, she was not notified of this revocation before she was detained, raising further questions around due process.

“Rümeysa’s arrest and detention are designed to punish her speech and chill the speech of others. Indeed, her arrest and detention are part of a concerted and systemic effort by Trump administration officials to punish students and others identified with pro-Palestine activism,’” wrote her lawyers in the petition.

Speaking to the Sampan the week after her client was detained, attorney Mahsa Khanbabai, said: “I do think protests can help change the tide, but it is but one piece of the puzzle. Alumni should call on universities to support free speech, and to protect their international students, and calling on senators and reps.”

Öztürk was detained by six masked, plainclothes strangers, who claimed to be police, on the street near her house. Video of the scene that’s now played on news outlets around the world shows the people approach her, grab her phone from her hands and take off her backpack before handcuffing her hands behind her back while she screamed to her mother, with whom she had been talking to on the phone. She can be heard asking to call the police, and the people taking her tell her “We are the police” while a bystander exclaims, “Well you don’t look like it, why are you hiding your faces?”

Öztürk was quickly whisked into a waiting, unmarked SUV, and shortly after taken to a detention center in Louisiana.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio defended Öztürk’s detention days later in a press conference saying, the department revoked her visa: “We gave you a visa to come and study and get a degree, not to become a social activist that tears up our university campuses. And if we’ve given you a visa, and then you decide to do that, we’re going to take it away.” Rubio stated at the time that the State Department had already revoked visas of more than 300 students accused of being pro-Palestinian activists, leading many to call into question the right to free speech in the United States.

No evidence has been given by the Trump administration that Öztürk was involved any illegal activity. She helped co-author an op-ed for Tufts student newspaper (https://www.tuftsdaily.com/article/2024/03/4ftk27sm6jkj) that criticized the school’s policy on divesting from companies associated with Israel. The article was cosigned by three other students and endorsed by 32 others from Tufts and reads in part, “Credible accusations against Israel include accounts of deliberate starvation and indiscriminate slaughter of Palestinian civilians and plausible genocide.” The article did not mention Hamas.

A Massachusetts District court ruled in the days after the detention that “further hearings are required” and that Öztürk can’t be deported at this time. She is currently in Louisiana at a for profit detention facility holding ICE detainees, according to her lawyer.

Days after Ozturk’s detention, dozens of U.S. lawmakers – including U.S. Rep. Ayanna Pressley and Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Edward Markey of Massachusetts – issued a statement criticizing the administration for summarily detaining and deporting “legal residents of this country merely for expressing their political views.”

-Adam Smith contributed to this report.