Federal immigration authorities have moved against at least four Iranian nationals with connections to the Iranian government, revoking their legal status in the United States and, in two cases, placing them under arrest pending deportation.
The niece and grand-niece of deceased Iranian Revolutionary Guard Major General Qassem Soleimani were arrested Friday night after their lawful permanent resident status was terminated. Hamideh Soleimani Afshar and her daughter are now being held by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
DHS said Afshar entered the United States on a tourist visa in June 2015, was granted asylum in 2019, and became a green card holder in 2021. Her daughter entered on a student visa in July 2015 and received a green card in 2023. The government now contends those asylum claims were fraudulent. A naturalization application Afshar filed in 2025 disclosed she had traveled to Iran at least four times since receiving her green card.
The State Department accused Afshar of promoting Iranian regime propaganda, celebrating attacks against American soldiers and military facilities in the Middle East, praising Iran’s new Supreme Leader, and denouncing America as the “Great Satan” — conduct documented, the department said, through a recently deleted Instagram account. Afshar’s husband was separately barred from entering the country.
“The Trump Administration will not allow our country to become a home for foreign nationals who support anti-American terrorist regimes,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio wrote on X.
Earlier this month, Rubio also revoked the legal status of Fatemeh Ardeshir-Larijani, a physician and the daughter of Ali Larijani, who served as Secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council until he was killed in a U.S.-Israeli airstrike on March 17. Her husband, Seyed Kalantar Motamedi, also had his legal status revoked. Both are no longer in the United States and are barred from returning.
The current actions are not the first of their kind. Before the outbreak of the Iran war, the State Department revoked or declined to renew the visas of several Iranian diplomats and staff at Iran’s mission to the United Nations, including the deputy ambassador. The department has said that move was made on December 4 and was unrelated to either the protests or the conflict.
Rubio has invoked the same rarely used powers in previous cases involving pro-Palestinian activists with legal status, including Columbia University student Mahmoud Khalil. Those efforts have faced federal court challenges, with lawsuits alleging the determinations penalized protected free speech.
The Iranian mission to the United Nations did not respond to a request for comment Saturday.
