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The Trump administration divulged sensitive information about Iranian asylum seekers to the Iranian government as it sought to deport them, putting their lives in danger, a lawsuit filed on Tuesday alleges.
The lawsuit, filed by the Iranian American Legal Defense Fund and Public Citizen Litigation Group, says that Trump administration officials held secretive meetings in which they shared information about Iranian asylum seekers that could subject them and their family members to persecution, torture, or death upon their return to Iran.
The government shared information about hundreds of Iranian detainees seeking asylum, the lawsuit says. The detainees, rounded up as part of President Donald Trump’s mass deportation agenda, had previously shared such information to demonstrate the reasons they needed to flee Iran and seek asylum in the U.S., the court filing details.
This information included details regarding their religious or political beliefs and sexual orientation that the U.S. State Department officially acknowledges may put them in danger in Iran, as the Iranian government persecutes groups like LGBTQ people and religious minorities. The U.S. also allegedly shared documents about asylum seekers’ immigration records, despite legal requirements safeguarding that information.
“Sharing asylum seekers’ sensitive and confidential information with the very government from which they are seeking asylum is a betrayal of the asylum process and basic human rights,” said Jamal Abdi, president of the National Iranian American Council, in a statement to Truthout. “The Trump administration has not only shut down pathways to asylum for Iranians and numerous others as it wages war on their home countries — it is now also exposing vulnerable people seeking freedom in the United States to the very persecution they fled.”
The meetings began in March 2025, and took place monthly until the U.S. and Israel launched their war on Iran in February, the lawsuit alleges. Months later, the Iranian government announced that it reached an agreement to receive hundreds of Iranian immigrants from the U.S. last year. Dozens have been deported thus far, including people seeking asylum. The lawsuit says that the U.S. is organizing another deportation flight to Iran in the weeks ahead.
The lawsuit is targeted at Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Secretary of Homeland Security Markwayne Mullin, and the Department of Homeland Security, among others. It seeks to have the information sharing policy ended, and for plaintiffs to be notified of information breaches in order for them to reopen their cases for asylum.
“State Department and DHS regulations prohibit ICE officials from revealing information from asylum applications to foreign governments. But that is exactly what they are doing,” said the plaintiffs’ lead counsel and Public Citizen Litigation Group attorney Michael Kirkpatrick.
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