Trapped inside: A Minnesota refugee family’s life on hold amid ICE arrests
Go Deeper.
Create an account or log in to save stories.
Like this?
Thanks for liking this story! We have added it to a list of your favorite stories.
Before the door opens, someone peeks through the curtain — just for a second. Then the curtain drops.
A moment later, the door unlocks, and we’re let inside a Minneapolis home. Every window is covered. The curtains are pulled tight, shutting out the street, the daylight — and any sense of normalcy.
This is how one refugee family is living now.
Across the country, immigrant families say fear of immigration enforcement has reshaped their daily lives. In Minneapolis, that fear has become so overwhelming for one family that they’ve stopped leaving their home altogether.
Turn Up Your Support
MPR News helps you turn down the noise and build shared understanding. Turn up your support for this public resource and keep trusted journalism accessible to all.
We’re here to meet a woman we’ll call “S.” She asked that her real name not be used because she doesn’t feel safe.
S is from Sudan. She spent years in a refugee camp in neighboring Chad before arriving in Minneapolis in 2023, resettled legally through the U.S. refugee program. Like many newly arrived refugees, she and her brothers and sister in law came with hope and plans.
“When we came here,” she says, speaking through translation. “We felt like our life was starting.”
The family found work. They enrolled in English classes. Everyone contributed. S had a clear goal for herself.
“I want to be a nursing assistant,” she said. “I want to help people.”
That sense of forward motion slowed abruptly in January, when immigration agents came to their house — twice.
The first time, S says, officers stood outside photographing her car and license plate. A few days later, they returned and knocked on the door. S didn’t open it. She asked whether they had a warrant and if they could slip it under the door.
She says they told her they did not — but that they would come back.
So far, they haven’t. But the visits were enough to change everything.
Since then, the family has stayed inside. They’ve stopped going to work. Volunteers now drop off groceries. The only members of the household who go outside are S's nephews and nieces who catch the bus to school. However, they struggle to concentrate in class, worrying that ICE might return while they're gone.
Before this, S says, they lived normally. They left the house without fear. They had legal refugee status — so she believed they were safe.
Now, she says, they live with constant anxiety. The fear, she explains, feels familiar.
“It reminds me of the war,” she says. “The fear of not knowing what will happen.”
S’s family is among a growing number of refugees in Minnesota whose lives have been disrupted by a new federal immigration enforcement initiative known as Operation PARRIS – short for Post-Admission Refugee Reverification and Integrity Strengthening.
Judge orders halt to arrests and detentions
A federal judge Wednesday temporarily blocked arrests and detentions of lawfully resettled refugees in Minnesota. The court order also requires the release of refugees who were detained in Minnesota or sent to Texas, while a legal challenge to the program moves forward.
Minnesota has become the launch point for the operation, which the Department of Homeland Security says is intended to re-examine refugee cases approved in recent years. DHS has framed the effort as a fraud prevention and vetting initiative, citing what it calls “a recent investigation that uncovered widespread immigration fraud in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area.”
But refugee advocates and resettlement agencies across the state say the rollout has been swift, aggressive — and deeply destabilizing for families who believed they had already cleared one of the most rigorous screening processes in the U.S. immigration system.
In the order, Judge John Tunheim wrote that refugees have a legal right to live peacefully in the United States and should not be subjected to the fear of being arrested or detained without warrants or cause. The order temporarily prevents immigration agents from continuing arrests and detentions of lawfully resettled refugees in Minnesota while the court considers a broader injunction.
However, it’s not clear if the temporary halt to arrests will mitigate the fear felt by refugee families. Before the order was issued, Jane Graupman, executive director of the International Institute of Minnesota, summed up the impact PARRIS has had on the clients her organization serves.
“It’s terrifying for people, and I can’t say that enough.”
‘I just want to feel safe again’
S remembers life in the refugee camp in Chad — the waiting, the uncertainty, the years suspended between past and future. She never imagined that fear would follow her to the United States.
Still, she holds onto hope.
She practices English when she can. She talks about becoming a nursing assistant. She believes that life won’t always feel like this — trapped inside, curtains drawn, listening for a knock at the door.
“I just want to feel safe again,” she said.
