Following a recent trip to Cambodia and Laos with the Kites to Southeast Asia* coalition, we spoke with Montha Chum, Executive Director of Minnesota 8 (MN8), about what she witnessed, how the recent increase in deportations has changed her work, and what she wants people to understand about the lives of community members after deportation.
You witnessed deportation-related events in Minnesota before traveling to Southeast Asia. How did that shape your experience on the trip?
Deportation isn’t new to me. Seeing it happen again, ten years after my brother was detained, was retraumatizing. It reminded me that when one person is detained or deported, it doesn’t just affect that individual. It affects their parents, children, partners, friends, and entire communities.
In Laos, I met people I had worked with in Minnesota who had since been deported. I saw how much fear and uncertainty they were carrying. During our listening tour, we asked what home was like for them before they were deported, and later asked, “What is home for you now?” Their answer was often, “Home is America. It’s Minnesota. Not here.”
Many people being deported to Laos were born in refugee camps and grew up in the United States. Some had never been to Laos before. It was especially painful to see Hmong community members sent to a country their families had once escaped, believing they would never have to return to a place where they had experienced persecution.
What made this Kites to SEA trip different from previous ones?
The scale and urgency felt completely different. With the increase in deportations during Operation Metro Surge, people were being uprooted from their families within hours, detained, and then sent overseas. I had spoken with some of these people in Minnesota just months earlier. I had seen them in my office, given them a hug, and then suddenly they were in another country. I could travel there to see them, but they couldn’t come home. That reality made me angry – not at the individual circumstances, but at the systems that make this possible. When you see how quickly families can be separated and how little support exists on the other side, you realize how much of this is the result of systems and policies, not individual choices.
At the same time, I was moved by the resilience of people on the ground. It was our first time in Laos, where we met with two of the first Hmong Americans deported in recent years. They are now working with Collective Freedom to support other community members in Laos. They help people navigate housing, paperwork, sponsorship, and employment, while also providing basic care packages to people arriving with little more than the clothes on their backs.
What similarities and differences did you see between Cambodia and Laos?
The biggest similarity is that these are people who were raised in America, deported to countries that may only be connected to them through their family histories. Many were born in refugee camps and never even set foot in either Cambodia or Laos.
In both places, people face isolation, stigma, language barriers, difficulty finding stable work, and significant emotional and mental health needs. But Cambodia has a much longer history of deportation, with more established networks of community members. In Laos, many people have arrived within the past year and a half, and there is much less infrastructure.
There is also a fundamental difference in who is being deported. People deported to Cambodia are generally ethnically Cambodian, while those being deported to Laos include Hmong, Mien, and Lao community members who may have little connection to the country beyond their family history. Hmong and Mien people don’t understand or speak the native language, which makes it even more difficult.
What do you see as some of the greatest needs right now?
Many women and wives of deported community members need mental health support and want to develop job skills, start businesses, or work as educators because of their English-language skills. Practical resources, such as refurbished laptops, could help turn those goals into opportunities.
At MN8, we’ve also had to rethink what transnational community support looks like. What happens when someone starts here, is detained in Texas, and then is deported thousands of miles away? How do we continue supporting that person and their family? We haven’t abandoned our previous work, but we’ve had to reassess our priorities to meet this moment.
What do you wish more people understood about deportation to Southeast Asia?
The people being deported aren’t simply “sent back to where they came from.” Many were born in refugee camps and grew up in the United States. They may not speak the language, have family, or know how to navigate life in the countries they’re sent to.
I say this often, but we are here because America was there. There’s a larger history behind these communities that gets overlooked when we talk about deportation.
The cost of deportation isn’t just the moment of removal. It’s decades of missed birthdays and graduations, disrupted livelihoods, strained relationships, and the emotional toll of being separated by thousands of miles, all of which accumulate year after year for families with no path to reunification.
It’s also important to remember who these people are beyond their immigration status or convictions. They are parents, children, partners, workers – people who’ve rebuilt lives, raised families, and contributed to their communities. They are loved.
That’s why I don’t like the word “deportee.” In Minnesota, we use “impacted leader” or “impacted community member who was deported.” These words remind us that a person is more than what’s happened to them.
Being deported doesn’t mean someone stops being part of our community. They’ve been uprooted, but not forgotten. Our responsibility to them, and to the families they leave behind, doesn’t end once they’re deported. We must continue to fight to keep families together.
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*Kites to Southeast Asia (SEA) is a coalition of Asian Prisoner Support Committee (APSC), Collective Freedom, Center for Empowering Refugees and Immigrants (CERI), Minnesota 8, New Light Wellness, KhAAG, the Seattle Clemency Project, and New Breath Foundation. On our journey to collective healing, Kites to SEA aims to learn about the deported community members’ needs, listen to their wisdom, and strengthen our solidarity.
Montha (she/her) was born in the Khao-I-Dang refugee camp in Thailand after her family fled genocide in Cambodia, immigrating to the U.S. at age four. Her advocacy began in 2016 when ICE detained her youngest brother and seven other Cambodian Minnesotans. She co-created the ReleaseMinnesota8 Campaign, which grew into Minnesota 8 (MN8), where she now serves as Executive Director and Co-founder.
At MN8, Montha leads efforts to fight deportations and family separation in Southeast Asian American communities while providing resources and support to those impacted by unjust immigration policies. As a 1.5-generation Cambodian American, she brings lived experience of war, displacement, and resettlement to her work.
Her leadership spans deportation defense, grassroots organizing, youth leadership, civic engagement, and cross-racial solidarity. Montha also serves as Board Chair of the Minnesota Freedom Fund’s C4 arm and as an Advisory Board Member of The People’s Collective for Justice and Liberation, advancing racial and immigrant justice in solidarity with BIPOC communities.
Known for her compassionate approach, Montha bridges impacted families with legal resources, ensuring access to justice. Outside of advocacy, she enjoys time with her grandkids, reading, and playing board games with loved ones.