Washington– An immigration judge on Wednesday granted asylum to a Chinese national who said he had a “well-founded fear” of persecution if returned to China after exposing human rights abuses there.
Guan Heng38, applied for asylum after arriving in the United States illegally in 2021. He has been detained since he was arrested in Immigration enforcement The operation took place in August as part of a mass deportation campaign by the Trump administration.
The Department of Homeland Security initially sought to deport Gowan to Uganda, however The plan was dropped In December, after his ordeal raised public concerns and attracted attention on Capitol Hill.
Guan was secretly filmed in 2020 Detention facilities in XinjiangThis adds to a body of evidence of what activists say are widespread human rights violations in the Chinese region, where up to a million members of ethnic minorities, especially Uyghurs, have been imprisoned.
During Wednesday’s hearing in Napanoch, New York, Guan was asked whether his intention in filming the detention facilities and then releasing the video a few days before arriving in the United States was to give him a reason to apply for asylum. He said that was not his goal.
“I sympathized with the Uyghurs who were persecuted,” Guan, speaking via video link from Broome County Correctional Facility, told the court through an interpreter.
He told the Associated Press that Guan knew he had to leave China if he wanted to release the footage In a recent interview. He went first to Hong Kong and from there to Ecuador, where Chinese tourists can travel without a visa, and then to the Bahamas. He released most of what he had Video clips on YouTube Before boarding the boat to Florida in October 2021.
Joan told the judge he did not know if he would survive the boat trip and wanted to make sure he saw the footage. Guan said that after the video was published, police in China interrogated his father three times.
The Chinese government has denied allegations of rights abuses in Xinjiang, saying it runs vocational training programs to help locals learn employable skills while rooting out extremist ideas, and has silenced dissenting views through a range of coercive means.
Guan’s lawyer, Chen Chuangchuang, said in his closing statement that this case is “a model example of why asylum should exist” and that the United States has a “moral and legal responsibility” to grant Guan asylum.
In handing down his ruling, Judge Charles Auslander told Gowan that the court found him to be a reliable witness and that he had proven his legal eligibility for asylum. He said Guan was right to fear retaliation if he was returned, noting that the Chinese government had interrogated his family and inquired about Guan’s whereabouts and past activities.
It has been an increasingly rare successful outcome for an asylum seeker since President Donald Trump returned to office. The asylum approval rate fell to 10% in 2025, from 28% between 2010 and 2024, according to federal data compiled by Mobile Pathways, a California-based nonprofit that helps immigrants navigate the U.S. legal system.
However, Joan was not immediately released because a DHS lawyer said the department reserves the right to appeal. She has 30 days to do so, but Auslander urged DHS to make its decision soon, noting that Joan has already been detained for about five months.