Anti-ICE folks say naturalized U.S. citizen ChongLy “Saly Vang” Scott Thao is why they’re protesting—or people like him. They’re spreading his story far and wide.
We deal in facts. So, let’s dig into it.
ICE critics allege he is kindly old Hmong man with no criminal record who was wrongly “dragged” out of his house by ICE in St. Paul in boxer shorts, driven around for an hour, and then deposited back home.
“Hmong elder, a U.S. citizen, forced from Minnesota home at gunpoint, family says,” blared the St. Paul Pioneer Press frame on the story.
“St. Paul mayor Kaohly Her ‘livid’ after ICE wrongly targets family friend, escorts him undressed into cold,” blared the Minneapolis Star-Tribune.
“St. Paul ICE raid: Elderly citizen taken in shorts and Crocs,” blared Fox 9 Minneapolis.
Let’s unpack.
➡️ ICE was at his home conducting a targeted operation of 2 convicted sex offenders. “One of the criminal targets had convictions for sex with a minor and sexual assault. The other target had convictions for sex assault with penetration in the first degree, domestic violence, and violating a protective order. Both also have convictions for failure to register as sex offenders. They both have final orders of removal from an immigration judge.”
➡️ They are “Lue Moua, who is wanted for sexual assault of a minor, rape, kidnapping, and domestic violence, and Kongmeng Vang, who is wanted for sexual assault and gang activity.” [Pioneer Press]
➡️ Lue Moua and Kongmeng Vang are the “worst of the worst,” DHS says, and they remain at large.
➡️ Thao lived with these “two convicted sex offenders at the site of the operation,” DHS alleged.
➡️ Thao REFUSED to be fingerprinted or facially ID’d, alleged DHS.
➡️ He “matched the description of the targets,” DHS wrote.
➡️ Agitators blew whistles, honked, and called ICE agents “f*cking as*holes” during the operation, video shows.
➡️ As with any law enforcement agency, “it is standard protocol to hold all individuals in a house of an operation for safety of the public and law enforcement,” DHS says.
➡️ The two “sexual predators remain AT LARGE in St. Paul.”
➡️ Reuters took a widely circulated photo of him. Video and photos show him being walked out, not dragged.
THE FAMILY RESPONDS to LOCAL & NATIONAL MEDIA
What has the family told local and national media?
➡️ The family denies he has ever lived with the sexual offenders in question. They say he is not tied to them. “We believe they were looking for someone who previously lived there,” a family member wrote in a widely circulated post. He is the son of a woman who was a nurse who treated American soldiers during the Vietnam War, according to Fox 9 (the Hmong helped Americans during that war.)
➡️ They say he was driven around for an hour, fingerprinted, questioned and then released. They say the door was broken down and a gun put to his daughter in law’s head. The mayor alleged, “They didn’t ask for ID. They didn’t ask to verify if it was the right person.”
➡️ There is a GoFundMe for Thao. It says: “He was placed into a SUV, and driven around for nearly an hour while being questioned. Only after fingerprinting and running his information did ICE confirm what should have been known from the start — he is a U.S. citizen and had NO criminal record. He was dropped back at home with no apology and no explanation.”
➡️ The mayor said the family lived there 2 years and “the person they are looking for does not live there anymore” — a seeming acknowledgement he once did.
➡️ It is true he is a citizen with no record.
ANALYSIS
➡️ Why were the convicted sexual predators released into the community in the first place? If all jurisdictions honored ICE detainers in jails, there would be fewer street operations like this. DHS has called on Minnesota to honor more than 1,300 ICE detainers in correctional facilities (note: in WI, some jurisdictions won’t honor them, and the ACLU has a pending lawsuit before the liberal Supreme Court seeking a ruling barring sheriffs from honoring them. That means, upon release, ICE must conduct more dangerous street operations.)
➡️ Why didn’t he initially allow them to ID him, per DHS?
➡️ DHS did not immediately respond to requests for comment from media outlets — a mistake. They will frame the story around the information they have. Rapid response is better PR. On some level, this is a battle of narratives. By the time DHS released a response online, the frame was set.
➡️ Law enforcement was clearly operating under the belief that 2 dangerous sexual predators were at the home based on the address they had and needed to verify who Thao was. It is unreasonable to expect law enforcement to magically have the exact current address of every at-large sexual predator they seek. They are searching for them, going through the address histories they have. It appears at least one of the men did live there at one time.
➡️ Why didn’t the media write stories focused on them? ICE has arrested 10,000 criminal illegals in Minneapolis, 3,000 in the past few months, DHS says.
➡️ People expect 100% perfection from law enforcement — they’re never allowed to have an old address during a dangerous manhunt, etc., vs. putting any responsibility on the system that freed these predators and the predators themselves.
Can Hmong be deported? In the past, no. Laos wouldn’t take them; however, according to an October article from MPR News: “At least 15 Hmong Minnesotans have been arrested since June, and five of those individuals were subsequently deported from the U.S. to Laos. In the past, Laos has refused to receive deportees. But new pressure from the Trump administration has pushed Laos to begin accepting more refugees and issue travel documents.”
