Ozturk was then sent to a detention facility in Louisiana, according to federal immigration records. A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security asserted Ozturk “engaged in support of Hamas,” a US-designated terror group behind the Oct. 7 attack on Israel that sparked the conflict in Gaza, but did not provide evidence of that claim.
The demonstration at Nathan Tufts Park near Powder House Square drew protesters from Tufts and Harvard as well as surrounding neighborhoods. Union members waved signs, local activists handed out fliers. Some wore keffiyehs, others wore yarmulkes.
Members of the Democratic Socialists of America were out in force, sporting red T-shirts. One parent towed her toddlers up the hill in a classic little red wagon.
Mira Sadorge, a 22-year-old senior studying fine arts at Tufts, said she was drawn to the protest because now “it’s somebody from my school.”
“If I don’t show up, I don’t really see who else would,” she said. “We need to show support, get a sense of how many people believe the same, and organize.”
Philip Higonnet, 64, of Somerville, stood next to a friend who had turned a white paper plate into a sign of protest. It simply said, “WTF?? Hands off my neighbors.”
Higonnet said he “couldn’t [expletive] believe it” when he read the news of the student’s detainment. He reached out to neighbors and his son, a college student in Syracuse, N.Y., with lots of international friends.
“It is just so very important to be here,” he said. “Boston, New England, and the United States has always welcomed students and neighbors, and now to have this happen is just shocking.”
The Somerville Police Department estimated the crowd to be between 2,000 and 2,500 people. That was more than expected, according to Somerville police Captain Jeffrey DiGregorio, who noted that the crowd “was large but orderly.”
There were no incidents or arrests, he said. Tufts University police and State Police were also present.
The rally opened with a speaker who read a statement by Ozturk’s attorney, Mahsa Khanbabai.
“I hope to speak with [Ozturk] soon, and will be telling her about the outpouring of love and support,” the statement read. “Our country is built upon a system of laws and accountability. We look forward to her having her day in court.”
Susan McLucas, 76, said she lives just blocks away from where Ozturk was taken into custody.
“I’m very local, and I’ve been really upset hearing about all of these people abducted by ICE, and now we have one right in our own neighborhood,” McLucas said.
McLucas spent the morning fashioning a bright yellow piece of poster board into a sign she could hang around her neck, which read “ICE, release Rumeysa Ozturk and all the others!!!”
Earlier Wednesday, some students said that while they’d been aware of similar detentions of international students elsewhere in the country, it felt shocking to happen at Tufts.
“It hits closer to home, definitely,” said Elliott Riseman, a freshman. “It’s right at home.”
Video from a neighbor’s security camera that shows the arrest has circulated online, and Tufts University President Sunil Kumar said in a letter to the school community Tuesday that they had been informed a student was taken into custody and their visa had been “terminated.” The letter did not identify Ozturk by name.
Khanbabai, Ozturk’s attorney, said she has not been able to contact her. A federal judge in Boston on Tuesday ordered US Immigration and Customs Enforcement not to remove Ozturk from Massachusetts without prior notice.
It was unclear Wednesday why Ozturk was detained. She had voiced support for the pro-Palestinian movement at Tufts, but was not known as a prominent leader. Her lawyer said she is not aware of any charges against her.
Ellis Bedsworth, an undergraduate student at Tufts, said she read the email notifying students about the detainment Tuesday night.
“It’s scary, and it’s really sad that it’s happening,” she said while studying in the Mayer Campus Center Wednesday morning. “It feels really far away until it happens here, and it’s hard to know how to help.”
While Bedsworth said she was impressed by the speed with which Tufts notified students of the arrest, another student, Charlie Koenig, said he wished the email said more.
“The email Tufts sent last night was softly worded for what the situation is,” he said. “And [the university] is not doing enough to stop it.”
Monish Aswani, a 19-year-old sophomore economics major from Hong Kong, said his visa concerns had been temporarily assuaged after he managed to reenter the country after spring break without incident, but the arrest of Ozturk brought those worries back to the top of his mind.
“Knowing that I’m an international student as well, and maybe this could happen to me, is quite frightening,” he said.
Aswani said he understood if students were being removed for violating the terms of their visas, or if their acts of protest went too far. But he added that, from what he’d seen of the demonstrations on Tufts’ campus last year, they were relatively benign.
“People come from different places, they have different cultures, they have different identities, and they stand for different things,” he said. “And university is a place where you come together and you share these ideas, so you’re able to communicate freely and share your experiences and learn from others.”
“Not being able to do that does take a toll on people,” he added. “The government taking serious actions, deporting kids back to their home nations, seems like a step too far.”
Aswani noted his background in Hong Kong, a territory subject to harsh restrictions on free speech by the Chinese government. That situation is unique, he said, but he acknowledged that Ozturk’s arrest made for a worrying parallel.
“Someone who’s coming from, for example, Hong Kong, would think that coming into the US, they would have some sort of freedom,” he said. “Being able to do what they want, say what they want, protest and stand for what they stand for.”
Adriana Callen, a Tufts senior who lives in the area where the arrest took place, said she had noticed cars loitering in the area on Wednesday afternoon.
“We didn’t even put it together until hours later,” she said. “So it definitely was quite shocking. I wasn’t even honestly sure until right now.”
When she first heard the news of what had happened, she said she was “appalled.”
“I don’t even know how to react,” she added.
Callen said she didn’t know Ozturk, but that many of her international student friends who live in the area had expressed fears about going to classes on campus.
“People have a right to address problems that they see, problems in the world, problems everywhere,” she said. “We need to make sure everyone is able to express opinions, and that people shouldn’t have to fear their safety in order to do so.”
Joe Ferraro, 48, said he’s lived in the same house on Mason Street for his entire life. It’s a quiet neighborhood of spacious triple deckers, which is populated by as many families as it is college students — many of them, he noted, from other states, countries, and “all over the place.”
“I live next door to a college,” he said. “There’s new, young people walking up and down this street all the time. The subway is over there, the college is over there. This neighborhood is full of people her age all the time, and different ones all the time, every couple of years.”
He wasn’t at home when the arrest occurred, he said. But his parents, both in their 70s, had noticed a car with several people inside idling out front for around six hours. They were thinking of calling the police, he said, when the arrest happened.
When shown a video of the arrest, Ferraro became visibly emotional.
“It’s too much,” he said. “I don’t need to live in a place where people get plucked off the street like that, just walking around. That’s bananas. That’s just insane.”
“I don’t care what she was doing,” Ferraro continued. “You can’t just nab people off the sidewalk and throw them in a car and take them away, and expect anyone who’s seen it to be alright afterwards.”
The sudden arrest has shattered the sense of calm on the residential street. After seeing the footage of plainclothes ICE agents emerging from their unmarked cars, Ferraro said he is now on edge for anyone loitering in the area.
“Now every guy in normal clothes that’s hanging around here, that’s what I’m going to think,” he said.
Ferraro added that even his son, after hearing the news, is now afraid that his high school friends may be at risk.
“Half the kids he knows are terrified their parents will get taken off the street,” he said.
“Part of me is afraid to talk about it,” he said. “But come pluck me off the sidewalk then, if that’s what you get for talking about it.”
One international Tufts graduate student who asked to remain anonymous due to fear of retaliation said when she read the university’s email, she wasn’t concerned so much about herself as she was about the “state of this country.”
“This is just a sign of the times, and it’s probably not going to end well,” she said while studying in the Collaborative Learning and Innovation Complex Wednesday morning.
“It makes me wonder if I made the right choice coming here,” she said, adding she’s thought about leaving but she “doesn’t know how bad it has to get” for her to make that decision.
This story has been updated.
Camilo Fonseca of the Globe staff and Correspondent Emily Spatz also contributed to this report.
Nick Stoico can be reached at nick.stoico@globe.com. Tonya Alanez can be reached at tonya.alanez@globe.com. Follow her @talanez. Rita Chandler can be reached at rita.chandler@globe.com.
