US scuttles deportation flight to Iran as war and diplomacy grind on

A deportation flight carrying at least eight Iranian nationals out of Arizona was canceled without explanation Sunday morning, hours after their attorney filed emergency motions with a federal judge in Washington.

The plane in Mesa, Arizona, was bound for the country of Georgia, then Pakistan, then Iran, according to the Associated Press. Ali Rahnama, an attorney with the Iranian American Legal Defense Fund, had filed court papers on behalf of several detainees before the flight was halted. The government later filed sealed documents the public cannot read.

The scuttled flight is one piece of an eight-month war that shows no sign of ending. The US has carried out repeated strikes on Iran’s Qeshm Island, Iran’s foreign minister has threatened to “rain down hell,” and Qatari mediators are shuttling between Washington and Tehran trying to reach a deal that neither side appears ready to sign.

Court documents unsealed Nov. 5 revealed that the Trump administration held secret talks with Iran about deporting Iranian nationals even as the two countries traded fire, as The Guardian reported. The documents showed that as recently as mid-October, the administration planned to deport Iranians through an unnamed third country. Hundreds of emails between US immigration officials, released through the lawsuit, showed the two countries worked together to fly more than 100 Iranians back on three flights between September 2025 and January 2026.

Yasmin Chubin, executive director of the Iranian American Legal Defense Fund, said the consequences of sending people to a country at war with the United States “could be irreversible and individuals may face persecution, torture, or death.” She said it was “difficult to comprehend why the U.S. would forcibly deport Iranians, including asylum seekers, to Iran, amid ongoing military hostilities.”

US District Judge Ana C. Reyes, a Biden appointee, ordered the government to give the court 24 hours’ notice of any finalized deportation plan and five days’ written notice before carrying one out. In a transcript unsealed in October, Reyes told a Justice Department attorney that the United States was preparing to send people to a country the president has described as lawless and enemy territory.

“We are talking about sending individuals in our care and custody to a country that we have bombed and we may continue bombing, and is a declared enemy of this country,” Reyes said, per The Guardian. She warned she would initiate contempt proceedings if the administration violated her order.

The Justice Department argued in a court filing that the judge’s order effectively served as an injunction, “given the possibility of sanctions and contempt dangling overhead.” A Justice Department attorney, Dimitar Georgiev-Remmel, told the court the government was “executing lawful orders of removal” and that no specific deportation date had been set. At least one detainee attempted suicide upon learning he might be returned to Iran, and was moved to a Texas detention center.

DHS said in a statement to AP that “the Trump Administration is employing all lawful options to carry out the largest deportation operation in history.” ICE said it “does not comment on prospective removal operations, including flight schedules, passenger manifests, destinations, or individual case details.”

The deportation fight is unfolding against a military backdrop that has intensified since the Feb. 2026 start of the war. The US launched limited strikes on Qeshm Island late on Nov. 2, hours after Vice President JD Vance said he was optimistic about diplomacy, as The Guardian reported. Centcom described the strikes as defensive, aimed at missile batteries that had fired on American planes the day before. Similar exchanges have happened at least three times since major hostilities paused.

Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, warned on Nov. 8 that Tehran would “rain down hell” if the US resumes attacks, as Al Jazeera reported. He said Iran would “not go easy on American targets” in the region and offered a two-day proposal: meet Iran’s conditions, including an end to the war, and see results, or choose war. The statement came after state media reported an oil tanker caught fire hitting a naval mine east of the Strait of Hormuz.

Iran’s deputy foreign minister, Kazem Gharibabadi, said Iran remains in a state of war. “The aggression against Iran has not ended in our view, and until the military aggression is completely and permanently terminated Iran has the right to legitimate defence,” he said. He added that Iran was “not waiting for the results from the midterms to adjust its negotiating position.”

The midterms have complicated the picture. Democrats won control of both chambers of Congress on Nov. 4, soundly defeating Trump’s Republican Party. Vance told reporters the Iran war was the “real reason” Republicans lost, as The Guardian reported. Trump has played down the prospect of all-out war but told CNN that continued strikes are “highly unlikely” if negotiations progress, and that the US has marked 38 bridges in Iran as targets it “can knock down in literally one hour.”

Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani is scheduled to meet Trump at the White House on Monday. Iran has offered to lift its blockade on the Strait of Hormuz within two days if the US lifts economic constraints, but Tehran refuses to ship its 400 kilograms of highly enriched uranium to a third country or allow UN inspectors to return without upfront concessions. The most likely compromise, according to analysts, is down-blending the stockpile inside Iran under international supervision.

Andreas Krieg, a professor at King’s College London, said Iran is trying to convert its wartime gains into a new regional security arrangement. “Washington may believe it is conducting a limited campaign of coercion, while Tehran increasingly sees an unrestricted economic war against its survival,” he told Al Jazeera. “At some point, Iran may decide that the costs of continued restraint exceed the risks of escalation.”

What I think

The deportation flight is the detail that tells the whole story. The United States is bombing Iran and simultaneously trying to fly people back there. A federal judge had to order the government not to do it in secret, and the government’s response was to file sealed documents the public cannot read.

Judge Reyes asked the right question. What does it mean to send people in your custody to a country you have bombed and may bomb again? The Justice Department’s answer, that the government is “executing lawful orders of removal,” is the kind of phrase that sounds like law and is actually an admission. The law permits deportation. The war makes it something else.

The broader picture is no more coherent. The US strikes Qeshm and calls it defensive. Iran threatens to rain down hell and calls the US the aggressor. Trump says there is no war raging and also that he can knock down 38 bridges in an hour. Vance says the war is the reason Republicans lost the midterms, and the administration’s response is to keep striking and keep deporting. Qatar’s prime minister is flying to Washington to mediate a deal between two countries that are still shooting at each other.

Krieg is right that the two sides are describing different wars. Washington sees a limited coercion campaign. Tehran sees a war on its survival. That gap is not a misunderstanding. It is the reason the war is not ending, and no amount of mediation closes it unless one side changes its definition of what is happening. Eight months in, neither has.