Hamideh Soleimani Afshar, the 47-year-old niece of deceased Iranian Major General Qasem Soleimani, and her 25-year-old daughter Sarinasadat Hosseiny were arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Los Angeles on Friday. Both women had their green cards revoked and now sit in ICE custody, pending removal from the United States.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced the action, accusing Afshar of celebrating the deaths of U.S. soldiers during President Donald Trump's ongoing conflict with Iran.

"Until recently, Hamideh Soleimani Afshar and her daughter were green card holders living lavishly in the United States."

According to the Daily Mail, Rubio said Afshar used a since-deleted Instagram account to promote the Iranian regime and voice support for attacks on Americans. The State Department accused her of "promoting Iranian regime propaganda" and said she had praised the new Iranian Supreme Leader, denounced America as the "Great Satan," and voiced what they called her "unflinching support for the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, a designated terrorist organization."

A Decade of Exploitation

The timeline here tells a story that should infuriate every American who plays by the rules.

Afshar entered the United States in June 2015 on a tourist visa. Her daughter came along on a student visa. In 2019, a judge granted both women asylum. By 2021, they were green card holders. That same year, Afshar purchased a home in the Tujunga neighborhood of Los Angeles, a two-bedroom, two-bath property valued at $740,000, bought for $505,000 with a $365,000 mortgage.

She was, by every outward appearance, building a life in the country her uncle spent his career trying to destroy, and that she herself referred to as the "Great Satan."

Then came the naturalization application. In July 2025, Afshar disclosed that she had traveled to Iran at least four times since receiving her green card. For someone who claimed asylum from the Iranian regime, voluntarily returning to Iran on multiple occasions raises an obvious question: What exactly were you fleeing?

DHS called her asylum claims fraudulent. It is not hard to see why.

The Fraud Speaks for Itself

The asylum system exists to protect people with a genuine, well-founded fear of persecution. It does not exist as a backdoor immigration channel for relatives of foreign military commanders who want a comfortable American zip code while maintaining loyalty to the regime back home.

Afshar claimed she needed protection from Iran. Then she flew back at least four times. She claimed to fear the regime. Then she praised its leaders on social media and celebrated when Americans died. She enjoyed the freedoms of the country she openly despised, bought property in it, and applied for citizenship in it, all while cheerleading for a terrorist organization.

This is not a case that exists in some gray area. This is the kind of case the system was designed to catch and, for years, did not.

Rubio was direct about the administration's posture:

"The Trump Administration will not allow our country to become a home for foreign nationals who support anti-American terrorist regimes."

The Daughter's Case

Hosseiny's situation warrants a brief note. DHS has not accused her of asylum fraud or making statements against the United States. Her green card was nonetheless revoked alongside her mother's, and she was detained on Friday.

The Department of Homeland Security framed the broader principle plainly:

"It is a privilege to be granted 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."

That language matters. A green card is not a right. It is a privilege extended by the American people through their government, and it can be withdrawn when the terms of that privilege are violated.

The Backdrop

Afshar's uncle, Qasem Soleimani, commanded the Quds Force, the arm of Iran's military responsible for exporting terror across the Middle East. He was killed by a U.S. Reaper drone strike ordered by President Trump at Baghdad Airport in January 2020. The strike eliminated one of the most dangerous military figures in the region.

The current conflict between the U.S. and Iran adds weight to this arrest. President Trump began bombing Iran on February 28 and has said he will resume bombing within 48 hours if Iran does not reopen the Strait of Hormuz, a chokepoint that handles roughly 20 percent of the world's oil supply. The former Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was among those killed in the U.S.-Israel bombardment.

Against that backdrop, the presence of Soleimani's niece on American soil, enjoying American freedoms while praising the regime waging conflict against American interests, is not a footnote. It is a security question that should have been answered years ago.

What This Case Reveals

The deeper problem is not one woman gaming the system. It is a system that let itself be gamed for a decade. Consider the sequence:

• A tourist visa converts to an asylum claim.
• A judge grants asylum to the niece of a top Iranian military general.
• No one flags her repeated trips back to the country she supposedly fled.
• She becomes a green card holder and buys a three-quarter-million-dollar home in Los Angeles.
• Only when she applies for full citizenship and discloses her own travel history does the system catch up.

She caught herself. The immigration system did not catch her. That is the part of this story that should concern everyone beyond the individual case. How many others are living comfortably in the United States on asylum claims that would collapse under the slightest scrutiny?

Rubio said both women will be deported "at the first available opportunity." Good. But the decade-long gap between fraud and consequence is the real indictment. Not of this administration, which acted, but of the system that let a terror-regime propagandist settle into a quiet Los Angeles neighborhood and call it home.