The U.S arrests the niece and grandniece of late Iranian military commander Qassem Soleimani, Hamideh Soleimani Afshar and her daughter, Sarinasadat Hosseiny, accusing both women of promoting Iranian propaganda while living lavishly in Los Angeles. Both women have their Green Cards revoked and are pending deportation in the latest measure by Trump administration of ousting legal immigrants it believes are ‘threats’ to the U.S.
Amid the escalating quagmire of the US and Israel’s war on Iran, another war has been brewing on U.S soil, with federal agents on Friday night arresting the niece and grandniece of the late Iranian military commander Qassem Soleimani after the Trump administration revoked their lawful permanent resident status.
‘Hamideh Soleimani Afshar and her daughter (Sarinasadat Hosseiny, 25,) are now in the custody of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement,’ or ICE, the state department announced on Saturday.
U.S arrests and revokes Green Cards of late Iranian commander living in Los Angeles
Marco Rubio, the US Secretary of State, confirmed that the mother-daughter pair are ‘pending removal’ from the US, a development that came after the US and Israeli militaries began waging war on Iran in late February.
The mother and daughter’s ouster comes as the Trump administration has sought to revoke the legal immigration statuses of people it has determined to be aligned with enemies of the US.
Rubio’s statement said that the Trump administration ‘will not allow our country to become a home for foreign nationals who support anti-American terrorist regimes’.
Officials allege that Soleimani Afshar celebrated military strikes against American personnel and praised Iran’s new supreme leader after the US and Israel killed his predecessor, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in a large-scale air attack at the beginning of the war. They also accused her of labeling the US the ‘Great Satan’.
The statement about Soleimani Afshar further claims she voiced ‘unflinching support’ for the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) – all while maintaining a ‘lavish’ lifestyle in Los Angeles, with US officials pointing at her Instagram account as evidence according to the Guardian.
NEW: The niece and grand-niece of slain Iranian Gen. Qasem Soleimani were reportedly living ‘lavish’ lifestyles in Los Angeles before being arrested by ICE.
Hamideh Soleimani Afshar, the niece, had allegedly celebrated the Iranian attacks on US soldiers.
“While living in the… pic.twitter.com/Qx54LyckA9
— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) April 5, 2026
Questions of free speech and being related to U.S enemies
Hosseiny shared photos of her jetsetting on private planes, sunbathing on yachts, and dancing at music festivals while showing no signs of gainful employment.
Hosseiny was first admitted to the US on a student visa in 2015 and was given a green card by the Biden administration in 2023 according to the nypost.
In addition to the revocation of legal permanent resident – or green card – status for Soleimani Afshar and her daughter, her husband has also been formally prohibited from entering the US, officials said.
‘It is a privilege to be granted a green card to live in the United States of America,’ a DHS spokesperson told FOX News. ‘If we have reason to believe a green card holder poses a threat to the U.S., the green card will be revoked.’
The case raises questions about the limits of free speech rights in the US and the extent to which family members should be punished for their relations.
Ongoing removal of ‘un-welcomed’ legal immigrants by Trump administration
Citing media reports and social media posts, the State Department described Soleimani Afshar as ‘an outspoken supporter of the totalitarian, terrorist regime in Iran’. It added that such speech would not be tolerated under US President Donald Trump.
‘The Trump Administration will not allow our country to become a home for foreign nationals who support anti-American terrorist regimes,’ the statement said.
An online petition, started two months ago on the website Change.org, called for Soleimeini Afshar to be deported, and after the war began, it gained more than 4,000 signatures according to Aljazeera.
The measures followed a separate recent move by Rubio to terminate the legal status of Emory University academic, Fatemeh Ardeshir-Larijani – daughter of Ali Larijani, the former secretary of Iran’s supreme national security council – and her husband, Seyed Kalantar Motamedi. Both Ardeshir-Larijani and Motamedi have since departed the US and are under a permanent entry ban, according to the state department.
Larijani, one of the senior-most figures in the Iranian government, was killed in an Israeli air strike on March 17, as part of the ongoing war. Ardeshir-Larijani, meanwhile, had worked in oncology at the Emory University School of Medicine in the southern state of Georgia.
After Iran initiated a deadly crackdown against antigovernment protesters in December and January, demonstrators gathered at the university’s cancer institute to demand Ardeshir-Larijani’s removal.
The measures led to the US state department revoking or declining to renew the visas of several Iranian diplomats, including Iran’s deputy ambassador and staffers at its mission to the United Nations.
As of January, Ardeshir-Larijani was no longer employed by Emory, according to the school’s student newspaper, The Emory Wheel.
