Trump Administration Planned Iran Deportations During War, Court Records Show
Newly unsealed court records show the Trump administration prepared to deport Iranian detainees while the United States and Iran remained at war, forcing a federal judge to impose emergency notice requirements before any removal could proceed.
The transcript, unsealed Wednesday from an October 15 hearing in Iranian American Legal Defense Fund v. Rubio, records a blunt exchange. U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes asked whether the government intended to remove people in its custody “to a country with which we are at war.” A Justice Department lawyer answered: “That is my understanding, Your Honor.”
Reyes ordered the administration to notify the court within 24 hours of finalizing any removal plan and to give lawyers for the detainees at least five days’ written notice before a flight. She warned that officials could face contempt proceedings if they violated the order. The ruling did not permanently bar deportations; it created a narrow window for legal challenges before people could be placed on aircraft.
The Iranian American Legal Defense Fund said at least 12 detained Iranians had recently received warnings that they could be removed, potentially as early as November 8. According to the group, officials discussed routing detainees through Pakistan rather than flying them directly to Iran. The Associated Press reported that one detainee attempted suicide after learning that removal might be imminent.
No final flight date appears in the public record. That distinction matters. The documents establish active planning, government contacts and judicial intervention—not that a new wartime flight has already taken off.
The case also raises a separate and unresolved dispute over asylum confidentiality. The plaintiffs allege that U.S. officials shared or planned to share protected information from asylum files with Iranian authorities. The Department of Homeland Security denies providing confidential asylum records to Iran. The court has not issued a final ruling on the merits of that allegation.
AN EXISTING DEPORTATION CHANNEL
The administration did not create these contacts from nothing. More than 100 Iranians were deported on three flights in September 2025, December 2025 and January 2026, according to court records and reporting cited by the plaintiffs. Those removals occurred before the current war, but they demonstrate that Washington and Tehran had maintained a limited operational channel for repatriations even amid deep hostility.
That channel exposes the central contradiction now before the court. The administration portrays Iran as an active wartime adversary, yet it has also sought the Iranian government’s cooperation to receive people expelled from the United States. Governments at war often preserve narrow technical, consular or humanitarian contacts. Their existence does not prove a broader diplomatic opening. But using them to transfer detainees into a conflict zone gives an immigration decision immediate foreign-policy and human-rights consequences.
The government still holds the authority to enforce removal orders, subject to U.S. law and court review. Yet that authority is not unlimited. Federal law and international refugee protections restrict the return of people to places where they may face persecution or torture. Each detainee’s claim must be assessed individually, and the administration cannot erase that obligation by describing a transfer as routine enforcement.
The plaintiffs argue that some detainees fear imprisonment, torture or death if returned. Those remain claims that courts must test against evidence. What the unsealed transcript removes is any doubt that senior officials were considering removals while acknowledging the danger created by the war.
Reyes’s order therefore functions as a temporary brake, not a settlement. It forces the administration to disclose its next move before a flight departs and gives detainees’ lawyers a chance to ask a court for protection. With possible removals discussed for this weekend, that notice period may be the only barrier between an administrative decision and an irreversible transfer.
The episode shows how quickly the machinery of deportation can outpace the political claims surrounding a war. Washington cannot simultaneously invoke extraordinary wartime danger and treat removal to the same conflict zone as an ordinary bureaucratic act. The court has now demanded that the government explain that contradiction before anyone is put on a plane.
Sources and records: Associated Press · unsealed hearing transcript and Public Citizen release · ABC News · IALDF case documents
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