Government Moves to Strip Green Cards From Mother and Daughter Granted Asylum in 2019

Federal agents arrested Hamideh Soleimani Afshar and her daughter Sarinasadat Hosseiny in Los Angeles on the night of April 3, hours after Secretary of State Marco Rubio revoked their lawful permanent resident status. The two women, identified as the niece and grandniece of slain Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps commander Qasem Soleimani, are now in ICE custody awaiting removal proceedings.

The Trump administration says Afshar has been a supporter of Iran's "totalitarian, terrorist" regime. Rubio wrote on X that Afshar "celebrated attacks on Americans and referred to our country as the 'Great Satan,'" and the State Department alleged she supported Iranian Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei and promoted propaganda published by the Iranian regime. Her Instagram account, since deleted, documented all of it.

The case against Afshar gained particular force from her own paperwork. DHS records indicate Afshar entered the U.S. in 2015 and obtained a green card in 2021; however, her recent naturalization application revealed four trips back to Iran, which officials say invalidates her 2019 asylum claim. Asylum is predicated on an inability to safely return to one's home country. Traveling there four times, by the government's reasoning, makes that claim fraudulent.

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 under the Biden administration. Her daughter, Sarinasadat Hosseiny, also entered the U.S. in the summer of 2015 through a student visa and was granted asylum in 2019. Last July, Afshar filed a naturalization application, which disclosed the Iran travel that set the current proceedings in motion.

The State Department also highlighted Soleimani Afshar's "lavish lifestyle" in Los Angeles in its statement. As part of the decision, Soleimani Afshar's husband is also barred from entering the U.S.

The revocations fit a pattern of actions Rubio has taken against Iranian nationals with ties to the Tehran government in recent weeks. Earlier this month, Rubio also terminated the legal status of Fatemeh Ardeshir-Larijani, the daughter of the late Ali Larijani, formerly the head of Iran's Supreme National Security Council, and her husband Seyed Kalantar Motamedi. Both are no longer in the United States and are barred from future entry.

Qasem Soleimani was killed in a U.S. drone strike near Baghdad's international airport in January 2020, ordered during Trump's first term. His niece continued living in Los Angeles for another five years before her citizenship application triggered the review that ended with her arrest.