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An immigration judge granted asylum to a refugee on Wednesday Chinese He said the national had “well-founded concerns” about being persecuted if deported to China after exposing the country’s human rights abuses.
Guan Heng, 38, applied for asylum after arriving in the United States illegally in 2021. He has been detained since being arrested in August during an immigration enforcement operation as part of the Trump administration’s mass deportation campaign.
this Department of Homeland Security An initial attempt was made to deport Kwan to Uganda, but the plan was abandoned in December as his plight attracted public attention and drew attention from Capitol Hill.
Guan secretly filmed detention facilities in Xinjiang in 2020, providing evidence of what activists say are widespread human rights abuses in the Chinese region where up to 1 million members of ethnic minorities, particularly Uighurs, are imprisoned.
During a hearing in Napannock, New York, on Wednesday, Guan was asked whether his intention to film the detention facility and release the video days before arriving in the United States was to give him grounds to apply for asylum. He said that was not his goal.
“I sympathize with the Uyghurs who are being persecuted,” Guan told the court through a translator via video link from the Broome County Correctional Facility.
Guan told The Associated Press in a recent interview that he knew he would have to leave China if he wanted to release the video. he went first Hongkong from there to EcuadorChinese tourists can go there without a visa and then go to the Bahamas. Before sailing to Florida in October 2021, he posted most of the video clips on YouTube.
Kwan told the judge he didn’t know if he would survive the boat trip and wanted to make sure the video could be seen. Guan said Chinese police interrogated his father three times after the video was released.
The Chinese government has denied accusations of human rights abuses in Xinjiang, saying it runs vocational training programs to help local residents learn job skills while rooting out radical ideas and suppressing dissent through a range of coercive measures.
Guan’s lawyer, Chen Chuangchuang, said in closing arguments that the case was “a textbook example of why asylum should exist” and that the United States had a “moral and legal responsibility” to grant Guan asylum.
In handing down his ruling, Judge Charles Auslander told Guan that the court found him to be a reliable witness and that he had established his legal entitlement to asylum. He said Guan was right to fear retaliation if deported, noting that the Chinese government had interviewed his family and asked about Guan’s whereabouts and past activities.
It’s an increasingly rare success outcome for asylum seekers since President Donald Trump Return to the office. Asylum approval rates will drop from 28% between 2010 and 2024 to 10% in 2025, according to federal data compiled by Mobile Pathways, a California-based nonprofit that helps immigrants navigate the U.S. legal system.
Guan was not immediately released, however, as lawyers for the Department of Homeland Security said the department reserved the right to appeal. It has 30 days to do so, but Auslander urged DHS to make a decision quickly, noting that Guan has been detained for about five months.