Exiled once Again: Consequences of the Congressional Expansion of Deportable Offenses on the Southeast Asian Refugee Community

Abstract

On November 16, 2003, the New York Times published "In a Homeland Far from Home," an article chronicling the life of Loeun Lun, a Cambodian refugee, whom the United States government deported to Cambodia due to recent changes in immigration law.' Loeun Lun was born to Soun Dok, an impoverished peanut farmer in the midst of the intense economic and social turmoil that defined Cambodia in 1975.2 During this period, Cambodia's communist dictatorship, the Khmer Rouge, brutally relocated citydwellers to the countryside and tore apart families, placing many into forced-labor camps.' Dok and Lun languished in one such labor camp, facing abuse at the hands of guards.4 At one point, soldiers buried Dok up to her neck in mud and left her to die to punish her for supplementing her meager allowance of gruel with bamboo shoots.5 She eventually escaped and reunited with Lun and together they