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When I initially came in the United States four years ago to begin my PhD at Cornell University, I thought I would be the least likely person to be targeted by federal immigration agents. From my perspective, holding a British passport seemed to grant a sort of protection similar to that enjoyed by diplomats—a mobility that had allowed me to work as a journalist safely across West Africa’s unstable Sahel region for years.

The situation deteriorated after I attended a pro-Palestinian demonstration on campus in September the previous year. We had halted a campus recruitment event because it included booths from companies that provided Israel with weapons used in its campaign in Gaza. Even though I was there for just five minutes, I was later barred from university grounds, a punishment that felt like a form of confinement since my home was on the university’s upstate New York campus. While I could continue living there, I was prohibited from entering any university premises.

In January, as the new administration came into power and issued a series of presidential directives aimed at non-citizen student protesters, I left my home and went into hiding at the remote home of a professor, fearing the reach of ICE. Three months later, I self-deported to Canada, then flew to Switzerland. I was prompted to flee after a acquaintance, who had spent time with me in Ithaca, was detained at a Florida airport and questioned about my whereabouts. I did not return to the UK because accounts indicated that pro-Palestine journalists had been detained there under terrorism laws, which filled me with apprehension.

Surveillance and Immigration Status Termination

I hoped my arrival in Switzerland would mark the end of my ordeal. But a fortnight later, two distressing emails appeared in my inbox. The first was from Cornell, notifying me that the US government had effectively revoked my student visa status. The second came from Google, stating that it had “received and responded to legal process” and provided my data to the Department of Homeland Security. These emails arrived just an hour and a half apart.

The quickfire emails validated my suspicion that I had been under observation and that if I attempted to re-enter the US, I would likely be arrested by ICE, similar to other student protesters. But the secrecy surrounding these processes and the lack of legal recourse to contest them raised more questions than they answered.

Was there any correspondence between Cornell and US government agencies prior to my visa being terminated? What did the most powerful government want with my Google data? Why did the US authorities target me? Had they constructed a case of suspicion based on my years working as a journalist covering the US-led “war on terror”? Was I targeted because I was Black and Muslim?

AI Surveillance and Risk-Assessment Tools

I may never get full answers, but an report by Amnesty International sheds new light on the concerning ways the US government has deployed secretive AI tech to mass-monitor, surveil, and evaluate non-US citizen students and immigrants.

Amnesty says that Babel X, software made by Virginia-based Babel Street, allegedly searches social media for “terrorism”-related content and tries to predict the potential intent behind posts. The software uses “persistent search” to constantly monitor new information once an initial query has been made. It is likely that my reportage—on topics ranging from Guantánamo to drone strikes in the Sahel and the role of British secret services in the Libyan civil war—was flagged. Amnesty International notes that predictive technologies have a wide margin of error, “can often be discriminatory and biased, and could lead to falsely labeling pro-Palestine content as antisemitic.”

Then there is Palantir’s ImmigrationOS, which generates an electronic case file to consolidate all information related to an immigrant investigation, allowing authorities to connect multiple investigations and establish relationships between cases. Using ImmigrationOS, ICE can also monitor self-deportations, and it was rolled out in April, the same month I left. It may help explain why the US took action to block my re-entry into the country when it did.

Predictive Enforcement and Absence of Legal Rights

This all exists in the predictive policing space that has expanded exponentially since the launch of the US-led “war on terror”—catch now, ask questions later. To this day, I have never been charged or tried for any crime, or for displaying antisemitic behavior. As made clear by a recent legal submission by the University of Chicago Law Clinic, filed on behalf of me and eight other non-citizen protesters to eight UN special rapporteurs, I’ve merely used my First Amendment free speech rights to oppose the killing of innocent people. It is the US government that has acted illegally and immorally.

The Amnesty report emphasizes the ways that big tech and powerful states are colluding in the surveillance, control, and expulsion of minorities and migrants, as well as activists and journalists. We’re seeing this unfold in Gaza, where Israel’s “algorithmic warfare” has reduced the territory into a wasteland of corpses and rubble, leaving Palestinians with nowhere to go and nothing to eat. The investigation further shows that the US is using tech to strip asylum seekers and migrants of their fundamental rights, subjecting them to arbitrary detention before they have a chance to plead their case or seek safety.

Personal Consequences and Thoughts

While I am far from regretting my actions, I now live in a month-to-month state of uncertainty of unstable living arrangements and persistent doubts about whether I can finish my degree before my funding is terminated. I have been forced to navigate obstacles to access life-saving medical treatment. I was perhaps overly optimistic to think that as a British national with a London accent, at an Ivy League university, I was immune to these injustices. But just before I left the US, Joe, my African American barber, reminded me that: “You’re just Black.” My Blackness made my status in the US conditional. And because I am also Muslim and write about these aspects of myself, it does not make things easier. It is no surprise that in a country with a history of racial slavery and post-9/11 Islamophobia, I would get flagged.

With this technology in the hands of an administration that has minimal respect for constitutional safeguards, we should all be cautious. What is piloted on minorities soon spreads into the mainstream.