On February 26th, at 6:30am New York time, federal agents from the United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) entered a Columbia University residential building and detained a student in the Columbia School of General Studies. The School of General Studies is the school that Dual BA students at Trinity attend in their last two years of the programme.
The incident was detailed in an email from Claire Shipman, Acting President of Columbia University: “Our understanding at this time is that the federal agents made misrepresentations to gain entry to the building to search for a “missing person.” We are working to gather more details,” she wrote.
According to the Columbia Spectator, School of General Studies Dean Lisa Rosen-Metsch wrote in an email to the school that “our Columbia [General Studies] student, Ellie”, was detained on Thursday morning. She added that the school is “working in close collaboration with University administration to support our student and their family during this very difficult situation”, calling the detainment “upsetting and unsettling for our community”.
The detained student appears to have been a neuroscience undergraduate student, Elmina Aghayeva, who posted a story on Instagram at 7am New York time that read “Dhs illegally arrested me. Please help.”
Aghaveyeva appears to have been released, according to New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani. In a post on X.com, Mamdani shared “I shared my concerns about Columbia student Elmina Aghayeva, who was detained by ICE this morning”. At about 3 pm New York Time, Mamdani posted “[President Donald Trump] has just informed me that she will be released imminently”.
Around the same time, Aghayeva shared on her Instagram story “Hi guys” “I am so grateful for everyone of you. I just got out a little while ago. I am safe and okay. In an uber otw back home.”
In Shipman’s university-wide email, she added “It is important to reiterate that all law enforcement agents must have a judicial warrant or judicial subpoena to access non-public areas of the University, including housing, classrooms, and areas requiring [Columbia ID] swipe access. An administrative warrant is not sufficient.” She also told students and staff to not allow DHS agents to “enter or accept service of a warrant or subpoena”.
Dual BA student Anand Shukla-Parekh, speaking to the University Times, said, “as far as any support/protection, Trinity admin has been absent”. Once Dual BA students arrive at Columbia, he said, Trinity “very much fades into the background unless you’re fulfilling some academic requirement”. “You cannot deny that this administration’s actions are deterring students from coming here — I can think of at least three Dual BA students who chose to stay [in Dublin] for those reasons.” He continued, “This is such a valuable program but it is founded on the idea of international cooperation and acceptance and this administration is diametrically opposed to those values.” He called the Dual BA experience “fragmented given that for some of us, the US is home while others are international in the US, and had to deal with things like the visa freezes last year”.
Speaking specifically on the fact that the detained student is in the School of General Studies at Columbia, Shukla-Parekh said, “[it’s] the same undergraduate college that the Dual BA is in, and it’s the undergraduate college with the most systemic issues in terms of lack of funding, access, etc. It’s meant for people taking non-traditional education pathways, who often have other systemic issues they’re dealing with outside university level.” He called it “an extra hit” to Dual BA students “that it was someone from our college”.
Trinity College Dublin Students’ Union’s (TCDSU) first Comhairle of the academic year saw the passing of a motion condemning the Dual BA programme. The motion, proposed by Harry Johnston, the Chair of Trinity Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS), said in a statement to the University Times at the time, “This motion is designed to protect the welfare of Trinity students, while also respecting students who wish to complete the Dual BA Programme. As the Students’ Union, the welfare of our students as well as their rights to freedom of association and freedom of expression. We have an obligation to speak up when our students are attacked.” Johnston also said, “Myself and Buster [Whaley] have been reached out to by Dual BA students … protesting in favour of Palestine who have been in receipt of extreme punishment.”
According to the Columbia Spectator, this is the first time DHS has detained a Columbia affiliate in a University-owned residence since Mahmoud Khalil, Palestinian activist and 2024 Graduate, was detained on March 8th, 2025.
According to the Columbia University subreddit, there is an emergency rally outside the Columbia campus planned for later today. The circulated poster reads, “All out to 116th & Broadway gates at noon to protest the detention of an undergraduate from a Columbia building this morning”.
TCDSU President Grace McNally, speaking to the University Times, said: “I utterly condemn the authoritarian escalation we are witnessing from Donald Trump and his administration, whose weaponisation of immigration enforcement through U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) represents a direct assault on civil liberties, academic freedom, and the fundamental right of students to organise.” She underscored the false pretenses under which the agent entered the premises of the university housing. McNally added, “This is not an isolated incident. Over the last two years, the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement strategy has increasingly targeted students with international status or activism ties. Just a year ago, ICE arrested Columbia graduate student Mahmoud Khalil, a lawful permanent resident and student activist, and sought his deportation, prompting protests and legal challenges. Shameful is the complicity and cowardice of Columbia University, whose failure to guarantee the safety and protection of its own students exposes the hollowness of its public commitments to free inquiry and global citizenship.”
On the Dual BA, McNally said “We will continue to speak up about the role of Trinity College Dublin, which continues to maintain and promote a Dual BA partnership without transparently confronting the real and growing dangers its students may face. We have condemned it and we must continue towards the cessation of this programme, for the welfare of students. Institutions that claim to stand for justice cannot continue business as usual while students are detained, intimidated, and treated as political targets. Silence is complicity, and we will not allow our university to normalise repression in the name of prestige or partnership.”
In a statement to the University Times, a spokesperson for the college said “Trinity works closely with colleagues in Columbia University to support students during the four years of the Dual BA programme.”
The Provost’s Office has been contacted for comment.
Additional reporting by Freja Goldman.
— Update: February 27th at 10:40 am —
The above story was updated to include a statement from the college and an update on the student’s detention, as well as including the full name of the student in question.
