US ICE Detains Nigerian-Born Professor Ann Lawani In California, Moves Her To Louisiana
By Trek Africa Newspaper
Nigerian-born nurse and professor Dr Ann Lawani has been detained by US immigration authorities for nearly two months, sparking calls for her release.
Dr Lawani, 39, who is the Statewide Master’s Entry MSN Programme Director at the University of San Francisco, USF, was arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, ICE, at her home in Lodi, California, on September 16, 2026, about three weeks into the fall semester.
By the afternoon of September 18, she had been moved through detention facilities in Stockton, California, Bakersfield, El Paso, Texas, before arriving at the South Louisiana ICE Processing Center, where she remains.
Family, students, community members, and US Rep. Josh Harder, D-Calif., have called on the Trump Administration to release her.
Lawani, who entered the US in 2007 on a visitor visa and applied for asylum, has been under a final deportation order since 2013. The Department of Homeland Security, DHS, said her asylum application was denied on August 6, 2013, and she received a final order of removal.
However, her attorney, Natalia Vieira Santana, said the same immigration judge also granted withholding of removal to Nigeria after finding she was more likely than not to face persecution if returned. The ruling prevents her removal to Nigeria. Her work permit remains valid until April 2029.
A federal judge in the Eastern District of California has blocked her removal while her habeas corpus petition filed on September 18 is pending, ordering DHS to justify her detention. On September 29, the judge rejected the government’s request to transfer the case to Louisiana.
The case has drawn attention after Lawani disappeared from ICE’s public detainee locator system, making it difficult for her family and lawyer to find her. DHS changed its policy earlier in 2026 to remove detainees with final deportation orders from the public database.
Lawani has no criminal history and has lived in Lodi for 13 years, where she works as a nurse at John Muir Health in the cardiovascular stroke unit and balances caregiving for her 83-year-old father who has cancer. At USF, she oversees about 230 nursing students.
The University of San Francisco said it is working to ensure she is afforded full and fair due process. A GoFundMe for her legal and family costs has raised over $50,000, while a http://Change.org petition has gathered over 15,000 signatures.
Rep. Harder, in an October 20 letter to DHS Secretary, demanded her immediate return to California and questioned alleged plans to remove her to an undisclosed third country.
