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By Billal Rahman
Immigration Reporter
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A California nurse and university professor has been held in U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody for nearly two months after being arrested at her home, prompting calls for her release from relatives, colleagues, and elected officials.
Dr. Ann Lawani, 39, was detained by federal immigration agents in Lodi, California, on September 16 and later transferred to Louisiana, according to her attorney and colleagues at the University of San Francisco, where she is a nursing professor.
A Department of Homeland Security (DHS) spokesperson told Newsweek that Lawani “received due process and was issued a final order of removal on August 6, 2013,” and “will remain in ICE custody pending removal from the United States.”
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The spokesperson said Lawani, a Nigerian national, legally entered the United States on June 7, 2007, on a temporary visa but remained after her authorized stay expired on July 6, 2007.
“To be clear: work authorization does not confer legal status in the U.S.,” the spokesperson added.
Newsweek has contacted Lawani's legal team for comment via email.
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Lawani applied for asylum within a year of arriving in the country, her attorney, Natalia Vieira Santanna, told KCRA. An immigration judge denied the application in August 2013 but granted Lawani withholding of removal to Nigeria, Santanna said.
Withholding of removal can prevent the government from deporting a person to a country where they are found likely to face persecution, but it does not provide permanent residency or eliminate an underlying removal order.
Santanna told KCRA that Lawani’s work authorization remains valid through April 2029.
Lawani works as a nurse at John Muir Health and as an educator at the University of San Francisco, where she oversees a master’s nursing program serving approximately 230 students.
Eileen K. Fry-Bowers, dean of the School of Nursing and Health Professions, said in a press release that Lawani’s detention has caused "real and mounting harm to the students and faculty who rely on her mentorship, to our accreditation-mandated curriculum work, and to the safety-net partnerships she has built."
Lawani was initially taken to Stockton and later moved to El Paso, Texas, before being transferred to the South Louisiana ICE Processing Center, according to NBC Bay Area.
Her family said it was unable to locate her through ICE’s online detainee locator during the transfers. Her brother, Samuel Lawani, told KCRA that the family learned she was in Louisiana only after she called him three days later.
Lawani’s disappearance from the locator came one day after ICE removed thousands of detainees with final removal orders from its Online Detainee Locator System on September 15, according to an Associated Press investigation. Three current and former ICE officials told the AP that the previously undisclosed change made detainees’ locations unavailable to the public, while lawyers said it could hinder last-minute legal challenges to deportation.
Lawani’s attorney filed a federal habeas corpus petition on September 18 challenging her detention, according to The New York Times.
On September 29, a federal judge rejected DHS’s request to move the case to Louisiana, finding that Lawani’s attorney could not reasonably have known where she was being held when the petition was filed. The judge also barred the government from removing Lawani while the case proceeds and ordered DHS to explain why she should not be released.
Rep. Josh Harder, whose district includes Lodi, has also called for Lawani’s release and return to California.
In an October 20 letter to Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, Harder pressed the agency leader about her transfer to Louisiana, her disappearance from ICE's detainee locator, and reports that authorities might seek to deport her to a third country.
In a November 10 press release, Harder's office said he had asked DHS to release Lawani under an order of supervision and disclose any proposed country of removal, supporting travel documents and the legal basis for her continued detention. He said Lawani's absence has disrupted her work at USF and her ability to care for her 83-year-old father.
"My family and I want to see my sister returned home safely and as soon as possible, and like so many families in our community, we want an end to the chaos caused by these agencies," Samuel Lawani, brother of Dr. Lawani, said in a press release.
National Nurses United, the largest union of registered nurses in the U.S., has also called for Lawani's immediate release.
In a November 12 statement, the union accused DHS of deliberately concealing her whereabouts. “They purposefully disappeared her, so as to deny her rights to communication with her family and her right to timely legal representation.”
The union also warned that Lawani was at “grave risk of being deported to a third country where she has no ties” and urged her employers to push for her release.
Contact Newsweek editor on this story: Edward Pearcey.
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