The dissonance between the president’s hard-line immigration policies and his offer of asylum to the athletes was striking. Australia took in five players.
President Trump, who closed down the U.S. asylum system at the start of his second term, made an unusual offer on Monday.
He said the 26-member Iranian women’s soccer team could come to the United States as refugees if Australia refused to take them in.
“Mr. Prime Minister, give ASYLUM,” Mr. Trump said on social media in an appeal to Prime Minister Anthony Albanese of Australia, where the women had been playing in a tournament. “The U.S. will take them if you won’t.”
In the end, Mr. Trump said he had spoken to Mr. Albanese about the Iranian soccer players and that five of the players were “taken care of,” others were being helped and some felt they should return to Iran to help their families. Australia later confirmed it had granted humanitarian visas to five members of the team.
But even for a president who frequently expresses conflicting views, the break between his call for asylum for the Iranian athletes and his own hard-line immigration policies, which have left thousands of refugees in limbo, was striking.
Earlier this year, the Trump administration deported about a dozen Iranians back to their home country even though the government there was violently targeting protesters. And last year, the administration struck a deal with Tehran to send Iranian deportees back to the nation on chartered planes, despite concern that Iranian dissidents or religious and ethnic minorities would face persecution in their homeland.