Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced Saturday that federal agents arrested two relatives of the late Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Major General Qasem Soleimani after Rubio terminated their lawful permanent resident status. The two, Soleimani's niece, Hamideh Soleimani Afshar, and Afshar's daughter, are now in the custody of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Daily Caller reported.
The State Department said the pair had been living a "lavish lifestyle in Los Angeles" while holding green cards. Their removal marks one of the most direct immigration enforcement actions the Trump administration has taken against individuals tied to a designated foreign terrorist organization.
Rubio posted on X:
"The Trump Administration will not allow our country to become a home for foreign nationals who support anti-American terrorist regimes."
The State Department's statement laid out a detailed case against Afshar's conduct while she lived in the United States. The department described her as "an outspoken supporter of the totalitarian, terrorist regime in Iran," citing both press reporting and her own social media commentary as evidence.
The statement went further, cataloging specific behavior. It said Afshar 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 what the department called "unflinching support for the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, a designated terror organization."
That is not a vague accusation. It is a government agency, on the record, listing the conduct of a green card holder who enjoyed the protections and privileges of lawful permanent residency, while openly cheering violence against the troops of the country that gave her that status.
The daughter's name has not been publicly released. The State Department statement identified her only as Afshar's daughter and the grandniece of Soleimani. No criminal charges were mentioned in the announcement; the action appears to be solely an immigration enforcement matter tied to Rubio's revocation of their LPR status.
Soleimani was no minor figure. He served as a major general in Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and was described as a crucial figure in providing advanced improvised explosive device components used against American troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. Those weapons maimed and killed U.S. service members for years.
A U.S. strike killed Soleimani in January 2020. His death removed one of the most consequential military leaders in Iran's network of proxy violence across the Middle East. But his family's presence inside the United States apparently continued, until now.
The broader context of the Trump administration's posture toward Iran includes recent signals about the trajectory of the Iran campaign, including the February 28 announcement that the U.S. military commenced Operation Epic Fury. President Trump disclosed that operation in a video posted to Truth Social early that morning.
Rubio's action did not come out of nowhere. He telegraphed this posture years before he became Secretary of State. On October 17, 2023, ten days after the Hamas attack that killed over 1,200 people in Israel, Rubio appeared on Fox News' "The Ingraham Angle" and spoke plainly about what the law required.
Rubio told host Laura Ingraham:
"The law says if you are a supporter of a terrorist organization you shouldn't even have a visa. So now, once you get that visa, if you identify yourself as a Hamas supporter, then you should have your visa canceled and you should be removed from the country."
That was Rubio as a senator, commenting on pro-Hamas demonstrations that followed the October 7 massacre. Now, as Secretary of State, he has the authority to act on that principle. And he did.
The administration has pursued a similar enforcement-first approach across multiple immigration fronts. The Supreme Court recently agreed to hear the administration's fight to end temporary protections for certain migrant groups, a case that will test the legal boundaries of executive authority over immigration status.
Set aside the Soleimani name for a moment. The underlying facts here raise a straightforward question that too many administrations have dodged: Should a foreign national who openly celebrates attacks on American troops, promotes propaganda for a regime that arms militias responsible for killing Americans, and praises a designated terror organization be allowed to hold a green card?
The law, as Rubio noted in 2023, already says no. Supporters of designated terrorist organizations are not supposed to receive immigration benefits in the first place. The question is whether anyone enforces that standard, and for how long these two individuals enjoyed LPR status while engaging in the conduct the State Department described.
The State Department statement pointedly noted that Afshar's support for the Iranian regime was documented by "both press reporting and her own social media commentary." In other words, this was not hidden. It was public. And yet green cards remained in hand until Rubio acted.
That gap, between what the law prohibits and what the system tolerates, is exactly the kind of failure that erodes public confidence in the immigration system. The administration has been winning legal battles on related immigration enforcement questions, but each case raises the same uncomfortable point: why did it take this long?
Several details remain unclear. The State Department did not specify the legal authority or process Rubio used to terminate the LPR status. It did not say whether the revocation was preceded by any administrative hearing or whether Afshar and her daughter will have the opportunity to contest the action in immigration court.
The exact location of the arrests was not disclosed. The daughter's full name was not released. And the timeline raises its own questions, how long had Afshar been living in Los Angeles, and when did her social media activity first come to the attention of federal authorities?
The administration's broader immigration enforcement agenda continues to generate legal challenges. The TPS fight involving hundreds of thousands of Haitian nationals is now before the Supreme Court, and the outcomes of those cases will shape the legal landscape for executive immigration authority for years.
None of those cases, however, involve individuals publicly celebrating attacks on American soldiers while living under the protection of American law. This one does.
There is a particular kind of gall in holding a green card, a privilege that millions of lawful applicants wait years to receive, while using your platform to cheer violence against the country that issued it. The State Department's description of Afshar's conduct, if accurate, paints a picture of someone who treated American residency as a convenience and American security as a joke.
Rubio's decision to revoke that status and place both individuals in ICE custody sends a clear message. But it also raises a harder question for the system that let this persist. The conduct the State Department described was not secret. It was on social media. It was in press reporting. And yet the green cards stayed active, through multiple administrations, until a Secretary of State decided to do something about it.
The administration has shown a willingness to pivot aggressively when existing tools prove insufficient, and this case fits that pattern. The tool here was straightforward: the law already bars terror supporters from immigration benefits. Someone finally used it.
When the niece of a man responsible for arming the people who killed American troops can live lavishly in Los Angeles while praising the regime that sent him, and keep her green card the whole time, the problem was never the law. It was the will to enforce it.
