A state pardons board dominated by Minnesota Democrats scrambled into an unscheduled emergency meeting Monday and threw a legal lifeline to a man the federal government had already loaded onto its deportation list.
The target of that lifeline: At “Ricky” Xayasounethone Chandee, a native of Laos who entered the United States as a minor and eventually secured Legal Permanent Resident status.
What followed his arrival, however, was a criminal record that spanned nearly two decades.
Chandee picked up three assault convictions in 1992. A federal immigration judge responded three years later by issuing a final order of removal — a legal directive that would sit dormant for decades before resurfacing this spring.
In 2008, Chandee returned to court. This time, prosecutors secured two convictions against him for aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, according to the Department of Homeland Security.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement moved on him in January, taking him into custody as part of Operation Metro Surge, a sweeping regional enforcement campaign.
Chandee landed in an ICE detention facility in Louisiana, and federal officials set a removal date. That date was fast approaching when the Minnesota Board of Pardons got word of the timeline.
The board, which had already penciled in a June vote on Chandee’s pardon request, scrapped that schedule and convened Monday instead.
The six members who cast votes include Governor Tim Walz, Attorney General Keith Ellison, and Minnesota Supreme Court Justice Natalie Hudson. All six voted in favor of clemency.
Chandee was not physically present for the session. His family and colleagues appeared before the board and argued on his behalf.
His son, Alex, spoke directly to the panel. “My dad wanted me to live the life he never had, and I believe my father has done very well in that,” Alex said.
Justice Hudson weighed in after the vote came down.
“There is nothing in this application, or nothing in the facts before us that would suggest that Mr. Chandee is a danger to the public in any way, shape or form,” she said, according to MPR News. “He has a lot of family support, which is obviously very important, and he’s had that support over the last 29 years.”
Chandee’s attorney, Linus Chan, filed a parallel legal challenge. A federal appeals court in Louisiana granted the appeal, freezing the deportation order for 14 days.
Chan acknowledged publicly that the Trump administration is expected to fight back against that ruling.
Washington did not wait long to respond. The Department of Homeland Security put out a press release and made clear it viewed the board’s action as a direct interference with federal removal authority.
DHS Acting Assistant Secretary Lauren Bis did not mince words. “The Minnesota Board of Pardons’ unanimous decision pardoning an illegal alien convicted of three violent assaults is absolute INSANITY,” Bis said.
“At Chandee lost his green card following his convictions for aggravated assault with a weapon. Following his criminal conviction, he was placed in removal proceedings and issued a final order of removal by a judge. Minnesota’s sanctuary politicians’ pardon took away this violent thug’s qualifying convictions that made him removable from the US.”
The agency added a broader statement about the nature of legal immigration status. “When you break our laws, that privilege should be revoked, and you should not be in this country,” DHS said.
Monday’s session was not an isolated event. The Minnesota Board of Pardons has been working through a broader caseload of pardon requests filed by immigrants facing deportation proceedings.
The board reviewed five such cases and recommended clemency in four of them. The single case where the board declined to act involved an individual carrying a kidnapping conviction.
