Advocate is preserving families, breaking poverty cycles and Asian American-proud

Forty-something ThaoMee Xiong is an experienced leader, legal advocate and proud Hmong American. As the newly named deputy director for the Coalition of Asian American Leaders (CAAL), Xiong is on a mission to aid immigrants who, after serving time for a crime, are in danger of deportation due to narrow exemptions for reopening and reviewing their cases. Xiong has put her Ivy League credentials to use in past positions with the Minnesota Department of Health and the city of St. Paul. The middle of nine children, she was just 3 years old when her family came to the U.S. after living in two Thai refugee camps for three years. She shares more below about her drive to conquer stereotypes and promote social justice.

Q: How did you go from Thai refugee camps to Wisconsin?

A: We were sponsored by a Catholic congregation in Appleton, Wis., so we became Catholic and attended Catholic school. As only the third Hmong family to settle in Appleton, we were a real novelty. The school environment was really rigorous, and I didn't like its strict, conservative aspects. I was quite a non-conformist but I didn't even know what it meant to be a non-conformist. I was just told I was "different."

Q: What did your parents do?

A: My mom was a factory worker; my dad was a janitor at my Catholic elementary school. I'm motivated to do what I do in part because, in the mid- to late '80s, my mom got death threats from her co-workers and my dad experienced a lot of discrimination from my white classmates. Their racial slurs were really blatant, but the good thing was I saw my dad fight back, and that made me feel proud. It also made me angry, especially since our school was pristine because he was taking such good care of it. He worked there for 30 years.

Q: What spurred this antagonism?

A: The Vietnam War had just ended, the U.S. was in a ton of social and political transition, the economy was bad and it was easy to blame immigrants for everything — and we happened to be the "right" kind, from southeast Asia. There was increasing violence against Asians then just like there is now.

A: I stood out in school because I was very vocal about the racial injustices in our community, and our teachers knew so little about me and my family that I played a dual role of educating my peers and teachers about Hmong history, culture and the war. I was a pretty good student, but when I told my teachers I was applying to prestigious East Coast schools, they said, "Oh, you'll get in because you're a minority." I didn't realize at the time that it would be a stretch to go to these schools. That's the beauty of being naive; it allows you to dream big.

Q: Why CAAL, why now?

A: Because of my time in Massachusetts, New York City and Philadelphia, I understood the value of building cross-cultural coalitions to advance public policy. I was part of CAAL before it was named CAAL in 2013, discussing the need to bring together different Asian ethnic communities. Since I worked for the Minnesota Department of Human Services between grad school and law school and I have family here, I knew Minnesota's Hmong American community was the most progressive place for a young Hmong American professional.

Q: What's your current area of focus?

A: In 2019, while with the city of St. Paul, I worked with a professor from the U of M Law School and an organizer from Release MN8. We started the Post-Conviction Relief coalition to advance a bill that would create an exemption in Minnesota's criminal codes to allow individuals with deportation orders to have their cases reopened if they had an unlawful conviction. Often, these people weren't given adequate legal advice, triggering an immigration consequence of deportation.

A: Adding the threat of deportation after someone has served their time is like a second sentence for the same offense. In America, we believe in second chances, and this bill allows wrongfully convicted Minnesotans the opportunity to access justice and stay with their families. The majority of Southeast Asians with removal orders happen to be male heads of households. Removing them from their families destroys the fabric of their community and creates a cycle of severe poverty — all due to the poor integration of our legal systems.

Q: How do you keep yourself strong and motivated?

A: I have a very strong cultural identity and history, and I ground myself in that to maintain my humanity. Every step of the way—college, grad school, law school, work—the messages I received from these institutions slowly tried to strip me of my identity, so I've had to dig deeply to remember who I am as a woman, Hmong person and refugee. Remembering the beauty in what makes me different allows me to feel powerful.

Q: You have a supportive husband (Patrick Vue) and two great kids. How do you relax?