I felt like an animal: Leqaa Kordia on ICE

Detainee from Paterson describes hospitalization

By: Hannan Adely
NorthJersey.com
USA Today Network - New Jersey

..... After suffering a seizure inside a Texas immigration detention center, Leqaa Kordia said, she was kept in chains that weighed down her hands and legs in a hospital room, while barred from contacting her family or attorneys.
..... The Paterson resident described the "terrifying" ordeal in a statement shared days after she was released from a hospital and sent back to the Prariieland Detention Facility.
..... Kordua, 33, ahs been held their for nearly a year, even though an mitigation judge twice ordered her released, in what her attorneys say is retaliation for pro-Palestinian advocacy.
..... "On February 6th, [2026] I woke up in the Prairieland Detention Facility's medical unit terrified and confused after having experienced the first seizure of my life,: Kordia said. "Not until enduring nearly a year of cruel confinement in inhumane conditions had I ever suffered one before. All I felt was fear, not knowing what was happening to me."
..... She fell down twice, witnesses told her, before she started to seize. As an ambulance drove her to the hospital, she was "dizzy, nauseous, and in pain.:
..... Her family said they learned from another detainee about what happened but could not get any information about her condition or where she was taken until the day she was released. A lawyer rushed to the location but was not allowed to see her.
..... Isolated, Kordia spent three days in the emergency room in chains - an experience she said was "dehumanizing from state to finish."
..... "My hands and legs were weighed down by heavy chains as the drew my blood and gave me medications," Kordia said.
..... "It was terrifying, I felt like an animal,. My hands are still full of marks from the heave metal. They even refused to remove the chains when I went to the bathroom or took a shower."
..... Kordia's attorneys and family had raised concerns about her, well-being long before the seizure, saying she and other detainees did not get adequate food or medical care. Her cousin Hamzah Abushaban said she appeared frail and ill during a recent visit.
..... At the hospital, Kordia said, a doctor advised her to reduce stress and eat food to avoid a future seizure. She questioned how she could while in detention.
..... "At Paririeland, your daily life p whether you can have access to the food or medicine you need or even a good night's sleep - is controlled by the private, for-profit business that runs this facility," she said.
..... "I've been here for 11 months, and the food is so bad it makes me sick. we live in filithy conditions. The best medicine for me and everyone else here is our freedom."
..... Scott Sutterfield, a spokesperson for LaSalle corrections, which operates the Prisieland Detention Facility, defended the care provided to detainees, saying it "exceeds established standards for health and safety." He said it induce "meals that meet the dietary needs of the individuals in our care, including options for those with specific dietary restrictions."

A protest and arrest

..... Kordia and her attorney say she was targeted for deportation after her arrest at a pro-Palestinian protest outside Columbia University in April 2024. More than 100 people were arrested, and charges against her were dropped the next day.
..... In March, [2025] she attended a voluntary meeting with Immigration and Customs Enforcement and was detained for allegedly overstaying her student visa. Kordia came to the United States from the West Bank on a valid visa in 2016 and said she mistakenly relinquished her student visa as she pursued permanent residency through her mother, a U.S. citizen.
..... The department of Homeland Security said in an email that she violated terms of her student visa. But the agency also pointed to her arrest at the protest and money she sent to relatives "living in tonsorial hostile to the U.S.." The money was sent to help with rent utilities and medical bills, court filings say.
..... Rights groups, lawmakers and supporters across the country have increased their calls to free Kordia. Paterson City Hall on February 13 [2026] calling for her release.
..... In her statement, Kordia she would continue to speak up for the freedom and dignity of others, "whether it is my family in Palestine, or the other women unjustly confined by ICE alongside me."
..... I want everyone to know what happened to me because the same things are happening to other women whew are locked up here," she said. "there are women who have terminal cancer, disabled women, pregnant women. they are all suffering, and none of us deserves to be here. NO one deserves this."

Rally for her release

..... Elected officials and community leaders delivered an emotional plea for her release at Pate son City Hall on February 13. [2026]
..... "Today [02/13/2026] in Paterson, our hearts our breaking because one of our residents is not just in custody but in chains, treated like an animal, abducted and for almost a year she has been treated inhumanely, said Paterson Mayor Andre Sayegh.
..... "This is a humanitarian plea. Let her go. Let her live."
..... "No one should be punished and held indefinitely without justice," Omar Farah, executive director of Muslim Advocates, co-counsel in Kordia's case said. "we stand with Leqaa and we stand with her family."

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