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WASHINGTON – In a decisive move, the Trump administration has annulled the U.S. visas or green cards of at least four individuals linked to the Iranian government, current or former. Among these, two have been apprehended by immigration officials and face deportation.
This week, Secretary of State Marco Rubio ruled that these individuals no longer meet the criteria for lawful permanent residency or entry into the United States. This action mirrors a previous decision made late last year when visas were revoked for several diplomats and staff associated with Iran’s mission to the United Nations.
On Saturday, the State Department announced that the niece and grand-niece of Qassem Soleimani, the former chief of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps who was killed by a U.S. airstrike near Baghdad in 2020, were detained by immigration authorities after Rubio nullified their green cards.
The department’s statement detailed that “Hamideh Soleimani Afshar and her daughter are currently under U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody,” further noting that Afshar’s spouse has been prohibited from entering the U.S.
The statement also disclosed that Afshar and her daughter had been enjoying an opulent lifestyle in Los Angeles for several years while openly endorsing the Iranian regime and its anti-American rhetoric.
She is “an outspoken supporter of the Iranian regime who celebrated attacks on Americans and referred to our country as the “Great Satan,” Rubio said in a post on X. “The Trump administration will not allow our country to become a home for foreign nationals who support anti-American terrorist regimes.”
The Iranian mission to the U.N. had no comment Saturday.
Afshar and her daughter are just the latest Iranians to have their legal status in the U.S. rescinded by Rubio, who recently revoked the visas of Fatemeh Ardeshir-Larijani, an academic and the daughter of Iran’s former national security adviser Ali Larijani who was killed in a U.S.-Israel airstrike last month. Her husband, Seyed Kalantar Motamedi, also had his visa revoked, the State Department said. Neither are still in the U.S.
In early December, well before the surge of anti-government protests in Iran and the start of the war, the State Department revoked or declined to renew visas of several Iranian diplomats, including the deputy ambassador, and staffers at Iran’s mission to the United Nations.
The department said Friday that action had been taken on Dec. 4 but declined to comment further “for privacy and security reasons” except to note that it was unrelated to either the protests or the war.
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AP reporter Farnoush Amiri contributed to this story.
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