Karen immigrants fled Myanmar's military. Now many are hiding from ICE.

This week is five years since the military in Myanmar seized control in a coup that forced many in the country to flee political repression and violence. Some came to Minnesota to join a large diaspora that was already here.

More than 20,000 people from Myanmar live in the state, which is home to the United States’ largest population of Karen people, an ethnic minority group from Myanmar. The Karen community includes U.S. citizens, refugees and asylum seekers.

The conflict and unrest in Myanmar has a complicated history that goes back more than 75 years, Jesse Phenow told MPR News. Phenow is co-director of The Urban Village, a St. Paul-based nonprofit that works with youth in the Myanmar diaspora.

Many of the Karen immigrants in Minnesota resettled here as refugees in the early 2000s, after fleeing to refugee camps in Thailand. Others have sought asylum, a distinct legal status. Some were part of pro-democracy or student groups in Myanmar, Phenow said.

“They've chosen to come to America because they believed this was a country that that stood for justice and stood for freedom, stood for democracy,” he said. “And we find ourselves now in a unique position reflecting on that promise.”

Recently, federal immigration activities have caused fear and uncertainty among Karen people in Minnesota. Phenow said ICE has detained recently-arrived refugees and asylum seekers from Myanmar. Agents have also entered apartment buildings and knocked on doors with photos of individuals they are seeking and letters asking people to report to the Whipple Federal Building.

Phenow said the situation is bringing up trauma for people who fled violence and government threats in Myanmar. “For those that escaped the initial harm by the military, they were identified through things like social media, photographs and nonprofit organizations,” he said. “Here they are, five years later, in a similar situation, in a place that they believed was going to provide something different.”

In the years since the 2021 coup, staff members of The Urban Village have traveled to Myanmar. Eh Ler Tha, the organization’s director of special projects and media, said the country is his second home.

“Being able to connect with my roots and seeing where my parents came from and the reality over there — every time I go back, I always walk away with something, like a sense of who I am as a person, as a Karen, as a Karen American,” he said.

At the same time, he said there is “real fear” among immigrants of what could await them if they were forced to return to Myanmar.

—Minnesota Now guest host Kelly Gordon and producer Alanna Elder

This story is part of our live coverage. Go to live updates.

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