ST. PAUL, Minn. – In a chilling incident, federal immigration agents reportedly forced entry into a Minnesota home and apprehended a U.S. citizen at gunpoint without a warrant. The individual, ChongLy “Scott” Thao, was taken outside in freezing temperatures wearing only his underwear, as detailed by his family and video evidence reviewed by The Associated Press.
Thao recounted to the AP how his daughter-in-law awakened him from a nap one Sunday afternoon, alerting him that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents were aggressively knocking on their St. Paul home. Advising her against opening the door, Thao was soon confronted by masked agents who stormed in, brandishing firearms and shouting commands, he recalled.
“I was trembling,” Thao shared. “They never presented a warrant; they simply broke the door down.”
This incident comes amid a significant influx of federal agents into the Twin Cities, where immigration authorities are under fire from both residents and local officials. The criticism stems from their warrantless detentions, confrontations with protestors, and the tragic shooting of Renee Good, a mother of three.
St. Paul Mayor Kaohly Her, herself a Hmong American, expressed outrage over Thao’s arrest, stating, “ICE is not targeting the hardened criminals they claim to pursue. Instead, they are indiscriminately targeting everyone they encounter. This is unacceptable and goes against American values.”
The encounter, which was captured on video, has drawn widespread attention and criticism.
Thao, who has been a U.S. citizen for decades, said that as he was being detained he asked his daughter-in-law to find his identification but the agents told him they didn’t want to see it.
Instead, as his 4-year-old grandson watched and cried, Thao was led out in handcuffs wearing only sandals and underwear with just a blanket wrapped around his shoulders.
Videos captured the scene, which included people blowing whistles and horns and neighbors screaming at the more than a dozen gun-toting agents to leave Thao’s family alone.
Thao said agents drove him “to the middle of nowhere” and made him get out of the car in the frigid weather so they could photograph him. He said he feared they would beat him. He was asked for his ID, which agents earlier prevented him from retrieving.
Agents eventually realized that he was a U.S. citizen with no criminal record, Thao said, and an hour or two later, they brought him back to his house. There they made him show his ID and then left without apologizing for detaining him or breaking his door, Thao said.
DHS defends operation
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security described the ICE operation at Thao’s home as a “targeted operation” seeking two convicted sex offenders.
“The US citizen lives with these two convicted sex offenders at the site of the operation,” DHS said. “The individual refused to be fingerprinted or facially ID’d. He matched the description of the targets.”
Thao’s family said in a statement that it “categorically disputes” the DHS account and “strongly objects to DHS’s attempt to publicly justify this conduct with false and misleading claims.”
Thao told the AP that only he, his son and daughter-in-law and his grandson live at the rental home. Neither they nor the property’s owner are listed in the Minnesota sex offender registry. The nearest sex offender listed as living in the zip code is more than two blocks away.
DHS did not respond to a request from The Associated Press seeking the identities of the “two convicted sex offenders” or why the agency believed they were present in Thao’s home.
Thao’s son, Chris Thao, said ICE agents stopped him while he was driving to work before they went to detain his father. He said he was driving a car he borrowed from his cousin’s boyfriend. Court records show that the boyfriend shares the first name of another Asian man who has been convicted of a sex offense. Chris Thao said the two people are not the same.
Family fled Laos after helping US
The family said they are particularly upset by ChongLy Thao’s treatment at the hands of the U.S. government because his mother had to flee to the U.S. from Laos when communists took over in the 1970s since she had supported American covert operations in the country and her life was in danger.
Thao’s adopted mother, Choua Thao, was a nurse who treated CIA-backed Hmong soldiers in the U.S. government’s “Secret War” from 1961 to 1975 against the communists, according to the Hmong Nurses Association website.
Choua Thao, who passed away in late December, “treated countless civilians and American soldiers, working closely with U.S. personnel,” her daughter-in-law Louansee Moua wrote on a GoFundMe page for the family.
ChongLy Thao says he’s planning to file a civil rights lawsuit against DHS and no longer feels secure to sleep in his home.
“I don’t feel safe at all,” Thao said. “What did I do wrong? I didn’t do anything.”
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Associated Press writer Michael Biesecker in Washington contributed.
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Brook is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.
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