The Trump administration allegedly violated US law by giving Iran confidential information about Iranian asylum applicants it planned to deport, according to a lawsuit filed last week by the Iranian American Legal Defense Fund (IALDF).
The IALDF filed the complaint on Tuesday jointly with Public Citizen Litigation Group in US District Court in Washington, DC, naming Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, and Acting Director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) David Venturella, along with their respective organizations, as defendants.
The plaintiffs claim that the US government violated federal confidentiality regulations, thereby exposing pro-democracy protesters, members of the LGBTQ community, and religious minorities to Tehran and endangering both the family members of the applicants who remain in Iran and the deportees upon their return.
ICE has rejected these claims, saying in a statement, “These allegations that ICE shared asylum application records with the Iranian government are false.”
IALDF alleges that in a March 2025 meeting, a senior official from the Iranian Interests Section of the Embassy of Pakistan requested a list from the State Department of detained Iranian nationals whom the US wanted to deport. In response, federal officials provided a list of roughly 150 names.
The two sides further agreed to hold monthly meetings between ICE and the Iranian government to regularly exchange files and information. Communication between the two parties has continued despite hostilities between the two nations, including military strikes in June 2025 and the war that broke out on February 28, 2026, according to the complaint.
Since the Trump administration returned to office in January 2025, almost 600 Iranians have been detained across the country, half of whom were taken into custody during the June 2025 conflict. Additionally, over 100 Iranians have been deported across three separate flights to Iran. These actions are part of a broader crackdown by the government on immigration that has led to an increase in detentions and deportations.
Plaintiff counsel: US more interested in deportation than human lives
“Despite the US’s ongoing war with Iran, the administration seems more committed to mass deportation than protecting human lives,” said Michael Kirkpatrick, the lead counsel for the plaintiffs, in a statement.
The complaint also alleges that ICE forced the detained asylum applicants to meet with officials from the Iranian Interests Section without the applicants’ consent. According to the lawsuit, these non-consensual meetings “solidified the detainees’ belief that they had been identified to the very same repressive government that they had fled.”
The US State Department, in past human rights reports, has acknowledged that the Iranian government persecutes various minority groups and engages in human rights abuses, including torture and unlawful killing.
Senators express concern to Rubio
In February 2026, 12 senators jointly sent a letter to Rubio expressing their concern over the deportation of the asylum seekers back to Iran.
“Given Iran’s horrific human rights record, we are deeply concerned that the Trump administration is returning people to a country where they may be persecuted or tortured, in violation of US and international law,” the letter stated.
According to Ali Rahnama, interim executive director of the IALDF, the organization “is asking the court to stop these disclosures immediately, order a full accounting of every record shared, and ensure no asylum seeker’s file ever again reaches the hands of their persecutors.”