Three arrested by federal agents had family ties to Iranian military general, regime spokesperson or security chief
United States federal agents arrested three Iranian nationals – including the son of a revolutionary at the center of the 1979 Iran hostage crisis – after the US state department terminated their green cards, the department announced on Saturday.
State department officials revoked the green card status of Seyed Eissa Hashemi, whose mother was an Iranian revolutionary who served as the spokesperson for Iran’s regime during the hostage crisis that defined the late Jimmy Carter’s presidency. The state department also revoked the green card – or legal permanent resident – statuses of Hashemi’s wife and son.
In a statement, the state department referred to Hashemi’s mother as “Screaming Mary”, and said she was “notorious for her role as the leading propagandist for the violent Islamists who perpetrated the Iran hostage crisis”.
Hashemi entered the US in 2014 on a visa and was eventually granted lawful permanent resident status in 2016 through the diversity immigrant visa program, according to the state department. The state department noted that the Trump administration has since ended the diversity visa program.
