WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Iranian American Legal Defense Fund filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., on July 7, 2026, alleging the Trump administration shared confidential information about Iranian asylum seekers with the Iranian government. Public Citizen Litigation Group is representing the plaintiff.

The lawsuit names the Department of Homeland Security, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Secretary of Homeland Security Markwayne Mullin, and the Department of State as defendants. Lawyers argue the administration began sharing information about asylum applications with Iran in March 2025. The complaint alleges U.S. officials periodically mailed or hand-delivered immigration files of Iranians in custody to the Iranian government.

According to the filing, applications for deportation relief and asylum were provided during monthly meetings between Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the Iranian Interests Section. These meetings, arranged by the State Department, began in March 2025 and used the Pakistani embassy as an intermediary. The lawsuit states meetings stopped after the U.S. attacked Iran in February 2026, but document sharing continued.

The alleged disclosures include identifying details, familial relationships, political opinions, and reasons detainees feared the Iranian government. The filing says the shared information included details from individuals who state they were persecuted for converting to Christianity, for their sexuality, or for participating in the 2022 Women, Life, Freedom protests.

The suit is based on testimony from detainees who reported being called into meetings with senior officials from the Iran Interest Section who already possessed information from their claims. It also cites confidential information from an Iranian government official confirming the policy.

Attorney Michael Kirkpatrick said, "The law is very clear that information within an asylum application or other applications for similar forms of protection cannot be shared particularly with the government that the individual is fleeing." He added, "That information could put them in grave risk upon return." Kirkpatrick stated shared individuals "could be detained. They could be interrogated. They could be sent to prison. They could be tortured. As well as the risk to their family and acquaintances who remain in Iran."

Kirkpatrick noted, "What's different here, though, is they are revealing information from the asylum applications, and that is a very specific category of information that is kept confidential." He said, "They shouldn't even reveal information from which one could infer that somebody had sought asylum."

Ali Rahnama, interim executive director, said, "Congress made these confidentiality protections mandatory precisely because lives depend on them, and no agency and no administration, of either party, may set them aside."

Federal regulations specify that records maintained by the Department of Homeland Security and immigration courts should be protected from disclosure. Rules from the late 1990s prohibit sharing information that could reveal an individual applied for asylum if they are being deported. The Department of Homeland Security and the Iranian Mission to the United Nations did not respond to requests for comment.