We need Governor Ferguson to act now and grant Tuan an immediate pardon! Everyday that Governor Ferguson doesn't take action, is a day that Tuan's life is at risk.

Tuan Thanh Phan is a 43-year-old resident of Washington State. He has been married to Ngoc Phan, his childhood friend and sweetheart, since 2009. He entered the US with his family in 1991 as a nine-year-old refugee from Vietnam. Tuan completed a 25 year-long sentence related to an arrest and plea deal in 2000, only four months into his 18th birthday, for firing a gun in response to a group that was assaulting him and his friends. He hoped to rejoin his wife and community upon the completion of his sentence in March 2025. Instead, Tuan was picked up by ICE from the WA Department of Corrections custody and transported to the Northwest Ice Processing Center, in Tacoma, WA on the basis of a 2009 deportation order Tuan had no idea existed.

Tuan was then transferred to Port Isabel Detention Center in Texas, where he was told on the evening of Monday, May 19th that he would be deported to South Sudan. Less than 24 hours later on Tuesday morning, Tuan and seven other men were flown out of the U.S., in blatant defiance of an existing court order issued by a federal judge that required ICE to provide notice and time for people to challenge their removal before being deported to a country not their own.

Tuan and others are currently being held in Djibouti after a federal judge diverted the plane and ordered they be allowed to contest their removal to South Sudan. Tuan and others are being held in a shipping container, shackled by their feet, with little to no information about the future. The Supreme Court recently struck down the federal judges order, effectively allowing third country deportations. These men now face imminent danger as they could be deported to South Sudan any day.

Governor Ferguson as the power to pardon Tuan and grant him the full legal freedom he needs to fight for his life.