The United States has revoked more than 175,000 visas since President Donald Trump returned to office, and the State Department says 2026 is on course to exceed the 2025 record of more than 100,000 revocations in a single year, according to the South China Morning Post. The surge is unfolding against the backdrop of an active military conflict between the United States and Iran that began in February 2026.
The State Department has cited a range of grounds for the cancellations: violating visa terms, committing crimes, calling for violence against U.S. citizens, fraud, abuse of the immigration system, and threats to national security. Officials announced cases involving nationals from North African countries alongside deportable cases involving Iranian, Kuwaiti, Cuban, and Laotian nationals, but provided no breakdown by visa type or nationality.
Within that broader sweep, the administration has moved separately and with unusual specificity against Iranian nationals it links to the government in Tehran. Secretary of State Marco Rubio personally certified the revocation of green cards held by Hamideh Soleimani Afshar and her daughter — relatives of slain Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) commander Qassem Soleimani. The two were taken into custody by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE); Afshar's husband was barred from entering the country, according to the Associated Press.
Rubio also cancelled the visa of Fateh Ard-Lariani, daughter of Iranian National Security Council Secretary Ali Larijani, along with her husband's visa. Larijani was reported killed in a U.S.-Israel strike, AP reported. Separately, the State Department revoked the green card of an individual identified as S. Eissaemi, whose mother was a prominent figure in Iran's 1979 Islamic Revolution and served as the country's spokesperson during the hostage crisis that year. The green cards of Eissaemi's wife and son were also revoked, the Guardian reported.
The targeted enforcement predates the outbreak of full hostilities. In February 2026, the U.S. Embassy in Iran announced visa restrictions on 18 Iranian regime officials and telecommunications industry leaders, plus their immediate family members — bringing the total targeted under a freedom-of-expression policy to 58 individuals, the embassy said.
Also in February 2026, the United States and Israel launched military strikes against Iran, killing Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and targeting nuclear and military infrastructure, according to the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR). The conflict reshaped the diplomatic and immigration environment almost immediately.
On 14 June 2026, the two sides reached an interim deal brokered by Pakistan. Its terms included reopening the Strait of Hormuz, a halt to Hezbollah-Israel fighting in Lebanon, and a 60-day pause in hostilities. But the arrangement has not held firmly. By early July, Trump publicly declared the ceasefire "over", though he said he would allow negotiations to continue — telling reporters that negotiators were "wasting their time."
Core disputes — over Iran's nuclear programme, control of the Strait of Hormuz, and sanctions relief — remain unresolved, and a durable settlement is described as elusive, CFR notes.
State Department spokesperson Tommy Pigott addressed both the war and the visa revocations publicly. NPR's Rob Schmitz spoke with Pigott about both issues on 15 August 2026, in an interview covering the administration's position on each. The specific content of that exchange has not been fully reproduced in available reports. The exact 2026 tally of revocations, and any breakdown by nationality, has not been published by the government.
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