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U.S. Federal agents arrested the niece and grandniece of slain Iranian Revolutionary Guards commander Qassem Soleimani on Saturday after Secretary of State Marco Rubio rescinded their lawful permanent resident status, the State Department confirmed, in what marks a sharp escalation of the Trump administration's use of immigration enforcement as a tool of foreign policy pressure against Iran.
Hamideh Soleimani Afshar and her daughter, who had been living in California, were taken into custody by Immigration and Customs Enforcement following Rubio's termination of their green cards.
The State Department said Afshar is "an outspoken supporter of the totalitarian, terrorist regime in Iran," citing both press reporting and her own social media activity.
According to the department, Afshar used her Instagram account to promote Iranian regime propaganda, celebrate attacks against American soldiers and military facilities in the Middle East, and voice support for the Revolutionary Guard Corps, which the United States has designated as a foreign terrorist organization. Her husband has also been barred from entering the country.
Earlier this month, Rubio also terminated the legal status of Fatemeh Ardeshir-Larijani, daughter of former Secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council Ali Larijani, along with her husband. The State Department said the two are no longer in the United States and are barred from re-entry.
Qassem Soleimani was one of Iran's most powerful military figures. Appointed in 1997 by then-IRGC commander-in-chief Yahya Rahim Safavi, he led the Quds Force, an elite overseas operations branch of the Revolutionary Guards established in the early 1980s with a mandate spanning the Middle East and beyond.
He was killed in a U.S. drone strike in Baghdad in January 2020 while traveling in a convoy that also carried senior leaders of Iraq's Popular Mobilisation Forces. Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the deputy head of the PMF, was also killed in the attack. The strike was ordered by the Trump administration during his first term and drew condemnation from Iran, which vowed retaliation.
The State Department framed the arrests in explicitly ideological terms, warning that the administration "will not allow our country to become a home for foreign nationals who support anti-American terrorist regimes." The department credited the Department of Homeland Security and ICE for their "continued partnership and collaboration in keeping Americans safe."
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