]U.S. Deported Bhutanese Who Were Here Legally. They Are Now Stateless. Fear and confusion grip a community

U.S. Deported Bhutanese Who Were Here Legally. They Are Now Stateless.
Fear and confusion grip a community of Asian refugees as the Trump administration cracks down on immigration. Since the missing men are stateless, it’s not clear where they’ll end up.


The news of deportations arrived as a trickle. A member of the Bhutanese community in Texas was taken away. Another picked up in Idaho. Then, one in Georgia.

“People started calling us in a panic to let us know ICE arrests have started,” said Robin Gurung, a community leader in Harrisburg, Pa., a major center of life for Bhutanese refugees in America.

Given the limited information from immigration officials and a cultural reluctance within the Bhutanese community to discuss the loss of loved ones, Mr. Gurung could only estimate the number of people detained and deported from his area and the rest of the state.

“At least 12 from here,” he said during a recent interview at a dumpling house near the Pennsylvania State Capitol. He paused, emphasizing the uncertainty, before continuing. A dozen “that we know of.”

As the Trump administration accelerated its controversial deportation program, primarily targeting undocumented immigrants from Mexico and Central and South America, confusion became a common theme. What is happening in the community from Bhutan, a sliver of a country near India and Nepal, has a similar opaque uncertainty, and its own set of vexing circumstances.

--------------------

Information from the Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement about the recent deportations has been sparse. The lack of transparency has left community leaders, politicians and grieving families in Harrisburg and the surrounding Central Pennsylvania region — which has taken in some 40,000 Bhutanese refugees over two decades — grappling for answers and consumed by fear.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/01/us/trump-immigration-deportations-missing.html?unlocked_article_code=1.D08.jYgm.tHFsJ3dWwmMx&smid=url-share