Federal agents arrested two relatives of slain Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps Maj. Gen. Qasem Soleimani in Los Angeles on Friday after Secretary of State Marco Rubio revoked their lawful permanent resident status, the State Department and Department of Homeland Security announced. Hamideh Soleimani Afshar, identified as Soleimani's niece, and her daughter are now in ICE custody pending removal from the United States.
Rubio confirmed the action on X, writing that he had personally terminated both women's legal status. The move marks one of the most pointed immigration enforcement actions yet against foreign nationals accused of supporting the Iranian regime while living on American soil.
The question the case raises is blunt: How did a close relative of one of America's most dangerous enemies end up with a green card, asylum protections, and a path to citizenship, all while allegedly promoting the propaganda of a designated terrorist organization from the comfort of a Los Angeles lifestyle?
The State Department announced Saturday that Afshar and her daughter had been arrested by federal agents and placed in ICE custody. DHS said ICE officers made the arrests Friday in Los Angeles, where both women had been living.
Rubio wrote on X:
"Afshar is the niece of deceased Iranian Major General Qasem Soleimani. She is also an outspoken supporter of the Iranian regime who celebrated attacks on Americans and referred to our country as the 'Great Satan.' This week, I terminated both Afshar and her daughter's legal status and they are now in ICE custody, pending removal from the United States."
The State Department went further. Officials said Afshar had "promoted Iranian regime propaganda, celebrated attacks against American soldiers and military facilities in the Middle East, praised the new Iranian Supreme Leader, denounced America as the 'Great Satan,' and voiced her unflinching support for the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, a designated terrorist organization."
And she did all of this, the State Department added, "while enjoying a lavish lifestyle in Los Angeles, as attested to by her frequent posting on her recently deleted Instagram account."
The New York Post identified Afshar's daughter as Sarinasadat Hosseiny. Both women were taken into custody after their green cards were revoked, and officials framed the arrests as part of a broader crackdown on foreign nationals in the U.S. who back hostile or terrorist-linked regimes.
DHS laid out a detailed immigration timeline that raises hard questions about how the system processed these cases. Afshar entered the United States in June 2015 on a tourist visa. Her daughter entered a month later, in July 2015, on a student visa.
Both were granted asylum in 2019. Afshar became a green card holder in 2021 under the Biden administration. Her daughter received her green card in 2023.
Then, in July 2025, Afshar filed a naturalization application, seeking full U.S. citizenship. That application revealed a detail that apparently caught the attention of federal officials. A DHS spokesperson told Fox News:
"In July 2025, she filed a naturalization application, where she disclosed she traveled to Iran at least four times since being issued a green card. Her trips to Iran illustrate her asylum claims were fraudulent."
That disclosure is damning on its face. Asylum is granted to people who demonstrate a well-founded fear of persecution in their home country. Traveling back to that country repeatedly, at least four times, after receiving protection undercuts the very basis of the claim. Federal officials appear to have drawn exactly that conclusion.
The administration's broader posture on ICE enforcement actions has been aggressive, with operations expanding across multiple states and targeting both illegal immigrants and lawful residents whose status is deemed fraudulent or who are accused of posing national security threats.
Qasem Soleimani was no ordinary military figure. As commander of the IRGC's Quds Force, he directed Iran's proxy warfare across the Middle East for years, orchestrating attacks that killed and maimed American service members. A U.S. airstrike in Baghdad in January 2020, during President Trump's first term, killed him.
That his niece was living in the United States, on a green card, with asylum protections, posting on Instagram, and filing for citizenship, while allegedly praising the very regime and military apparatus her uncle commanded is a failure that spans multiple administrations and agencies.
DHS spokesperson Lauren Bis framed the stakes plainly. As Just The News reported, the State Department described the arrests as following Rubio's termination of the women's lawful permanent resident status, with both now in ICE custody.
A DHS spokesperson stated:
"It is a privilege to be granted a green card to live in the United States of America. If we have reason to believe a green card holder poses a threat to the U.S., the green card will be revoked."
Afshar's husband has also been barred from entering the United States, officials said.
The Afshar case is not an isolated action. Earlier this month, the State Department also terminated the legal status of Fatemeh Ardeshir-Larijani, identified as the daughter of a former senior Iranian official, and her husband. Both are no longer in the United States and have been barred from reentry.
Taken together, these cases suggest a deliberate campaign by the Trump administration to identify and remove foreign nationals connected to the Iranian regime who obtained immigration benefits in the United States. The administration's announcement was direct: "The Trump Administration will not allow our country to become a home for foreign nationals who support anti-American terrorist regimes."
Newsmax reported that both women were taken into ICE custody pending removal rather than charged criminally, underscoring that the enforcement path here runs through immigration law and the revocation of status rather than through the criminal justice system.
Federal law enforcement has been active on multiple fronts in recent months. In Los Angeles alone, authorities have pursued cases ranging from alleged hospice fraud schemes to immigration enforcement targeting regime-linked individuals.
Several details remain unclear. The specific legal authority Rubio used to revoke the women's green cards has not been publicly identified. No court filing, removal notice, or charging document has been disclosed. The daughter's age and the precise dates of the arrests and announcements have not been specified beyond "Friday" and "Saturday."
It is also unclear whether Afshar or her daughter have legal representation or have contested the revocation. Neither woman's own statements appear in any public reporting on the case.
What is clear is the timeline. A woman entered the country on a tourist visa in 2015. She claimed asylum. She received it. She got a green card. She traveled back to the country she said she feared, at least four times. She applied for citizenship. And throughout, the government says, she was promoting the propaganda of a regime whose military killed Americans.
The system that allowed all of this to proceed uninterrupted for a decade deserves its own scrutiny. Accountability efforts like those seen in recent federal fraud investigations show what happens when enforcement finally catches up to exploitation, but the delay itself is the indictment.
The arrests are the right move. But the deeper problem is that it took this long. Asylum exists to protect the genuinely persecuted, not to provide a legal foothold for relatives of foreign military commanders who then use American freedom to champion the regime their family helped run.
Every fraudulent asylum claim that goes unchallenged makes the system weaker for the people who actually need it. Every green card handed to someone who turns around and flies home four times makes a mockery of the process. And every Instagram post praising a designated terrorist organization from a Los Angeles living room is a reminder that the vetting system failed.
The administration acted. The question taxpayers should ask is why no one acted sooner, and how many similar cases remain untouched in a system that spent a decade looking the other way.
