US State Department revokes green cards of three Iranian nationals it links to regime

Key Takeaways

• The State Department has terminated the lawful permanent resident (green card) status of three Iranian nationals—Seyed Eissa Hashemi and his wife and son—who were then arrested by federal agents, the department announced.
• The department tied the family to Iran’s regime and said Hashemi’s mother was a prominent propagandist during the 1979 hostage crisis; those are claims made by U.S. officials.
• The family acquired U.S. residence through the diversity immigrant visa program (admitted in 2014; LPR status granted 2016), a program the State Department said the Trump administration has since ended.
• The action sits alongside a string of similar revocations and arrests of people the U.S. links to Iranian officials, heightening scrutiny of Iranian-born residents and recent diversity-visas recipients.

What happened

The U.S. State Department announced it had terminated the green card (lawful permanent resident, or LPR) status of Seyed Eissa Hashemi and later revoked the LPR status of his wife and son; federal agents subsequently arrested the three, the department said. The State Department described Hashemi’s mother as a prominent spokesperson for Iran during the 1979 hostage crisis; those characterizations come from U.S. officials. Hashemi, the department said, entered the United States in 2014 on a visa and became an LPR in 2016 after receiving a diversity immigrant visa.

Legal and policy context

A “green card” means lawful permanent residence; losing it can trigger detention, removal (deportation) proceedings and bar eligibility for naturalization. The State Department can revoke immigrant visas and, in coordination with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Department of Justice (DOJ), refer cases for enforcement action when it alleges fraud, material misrepresentation, or national-security ties. It has been reported that U.S. officials have pursued similar revocations recently — for example, cases involving relatives of high-profile Iranian figures — as part of a broader policy emphasis on national-security vetting of immigrants from Iran. Those allegations are made by U.S. authorities and may be disputed by the individuals involved.

What this means for immigrants now

For green card holders and visa applicants—especially Iranians and former diversity-visa recipients—this signals heightened scrutiny and an increased risk that past family ties or political associations could be treated as grounds for revocation. Practical consequences include possible arrest, removal proceedings, and hurdles to naturalization; affected people should seek immigration counsel immediately. For the broader immigrant community, lawyers say this trend can lengthen vetting times and create uncertainty for family-based petitions and visa applicants while U.S. policy toward Iran remains volatile.

Source: Original Article