The following is a lightly edited transcript of the June 2 episode of the Daily Blast podcast. Listen to it here.
Greg Sargent: This is The Daily Blast from The New Republic, produced and presented by the DSR network. I’m your host, Greg Sargent.
Carol Hui has lived for 20 years in a small town in Missouri after coming to the United States from Hong Kong. She’s been raising a family in this town and works as a waitress and a house cleaner, and as The New York Times reports, she’s well liked by a lot of the locals. But recently, Carol was arrested, and she now faces potential deportation. This has shocked and dismayed many of the town’s residents, even though the area went overwhelmingly for Trump. Today, Carol Hui is talking to us about her ordeal from jail in Springfield, Missouri. She’s talking to us about the tensions this has unleashed in this small Trump-supporting town. At times, the conversation got very difficult and she broke down and cried. We also talked to Carol’s lawyer, who explains her situation later in this episode. But for now, we’re talking to Carol. Hi, Carol. Thank you so much for talking to us today.
Carol Hui: You’re welcome, guys. Thank you.
Sargent: Your name is Ming Li Hui, but we’ll call you Carol. Carol, can you tell us about your life in Kennett, Missouri? How long you’ve lived there, the family you’re raising, your jobs and your friends?
Hui: I moved to Kennett May 2004. And I was there to visit my friend; she was having baby at the hospital. And after that, we’re just looking around, and I really like Kennett. People say Kennett is really small because by that time we only have a little bit over 10,000 people. But for me, I feel like that’s enough, 10,000 people. This is not small town. I have to know everyone. It takes a long time to know everyone. And I really like it. So I decided to stay in Kennett.
Sargent: Carol, you have a family there and kids, right? Can you tell us about that?
Hui: We don’t marry yet because of the situation we have, but I call him as my husband. I have my husband and my three beautiful children. I got two boys and a girl. I love them so much. My three children, they’re doing really well in Kennett. I’m so proud. People love them and care about them. I have a wonderful church I go to, and I met a lot of good people.
Sargent: Carol, it looks as if the town is really quite shocked by what happened. According to Jack Healy of The New York Times, your church held a prayer vigil for you, and the waffle house where you work apparently held a fundraiser for “Carol Day” and brought in $20,000. Hundreds of locals have signed petitions. Can you talk about what that feels like? Did you know that there was all this support for you out there? What does it feel like?
Hui: I didn’t know until after the happening. And then I was so shocked. I didn’t know that many people loved me.
Sargent: I just want to be clear. Carol just said, “I didn’t know that many people loved me.” Can you talk about that?
Hui: Because I work, I take care of my kids, I love everyone I [meet] every day. I meet new people every day, and I try my best to make their day a good day. No matter [if] they come in the restaurant sad or angry, I would want that when they left the restaurant they’re happy. I care about people. I never think [that] people love me that much. When they do that to me, I was like, No way. I was like, For real? “Carol Day”? I’ve been famous, I joke to my son. He said, Mom, yeah, they make a date. So after the day happened, my son told me about what’s going on. I was like, I love them so much. Thank you so much for what they do for me. Hopefully I will see them soon.
Sargent: A lot of people in this town voted for Trump. What was it like during the campaign when Trump was campaigning on deporting all “illegals”? It seems as if a lot of Trump supporters either didn’t know it could lead to the removal of people like you, or didn’t ask themselves whether it might lead to the removal of people like you. What does that feel like?
Hui: That’s sad. That’s really sad. Because right now we have 49 women here. We have 20 to 25 women from ICE. Everybody here has a different story. All we want [is] to have a better life [for] ourselves, [for] our family, [for] our children. I hope more people understand it. I know they voted for Trump. Trump wants to make America better—that’s great. But we’re human. We make a mistake. But at least give us a chance to fix it. The other half of the people here, they were locked in here for doing.… They are not from ICE. There are other reasons [why] they were here—other 25 people here. They were doing drugs. They were talking about drugs, drinking. They were so different from us. They were just, Oh, I just need to be here for six months. I can go home and see my family. How about us?
If you lock me here for six months [and then] I can go home to see my family, I definitely will do it. I don’t care. I want to see my family. I want to be able to give a hug [to] my daughter, [to] my children. Everybody here—the 20 women—from Africa, Mexico, Russia, different places, we just need the government [to] protect us to stay here. We don’t ask for money. We don’t ask for food stamps. Anything to help … we will work, no matter what [it takes]. We will work [for] the money to take care of our family. I just want the people who voted for Trump, [who] support Trump [to know that] it’s good that Trump can help America get better, but we also [need] a balance. We also can help others, protect others. We are not criminal. I promise, all around here—the 20 women here—we’re not doing drugs. We don’t steal. We work what we have. And we love anybody, we do—no matter what skin color you are.
Sargent: Carol, I want to read you something that your friend Vanessa Cowart, who helped you convert to Catholicism, said to the Times. “No one voted to deport moms,” she said. “We were all under the impression we were just getting rid of the gangs, the people who came here in droves.” So that’s your friend Vanessa Cowart talking. She said no Trump people in the town really voted for something as horrible as what we’re seeing right now. How do you feel about that? Do you think it’s true that a lot of Trump voters didn’t know that they were voting to remove people like you?
Hui: I know over 90 percent [of] my town is with Trump for sure. But in their heart, I don’t think they mean to want to deport everybody from this country. Because I know my town people, they have a good heart too. They just want America [to] get better, like the prices, the gas price, [and for] people [to] have jobs. I don’t know. I don’t know.
Sargent: Carol, what originally brought you to this country, and what happened when you first got here?
Hui: It’s a long story. When I was young, my mother was beating me, hurting me so bad. She hate[d] me. She would hurt me really bad. When I graduated high school, I moved out, ran away from the house. My mom was beating me, hurting me, so I lived house to house [in] my friends’ house. I also lived in a storage room while I did my job. I feel like I lived in Hong Kong like a big mouse—just go [to] different places to hide, [hoping] one day my mom [won’t] find me to beat me again. So I [went] to New York. No, New York is not the one I can feel peace in.
Sargent: How old were you when you first came?
Hui: I was 24.
Sargent: Twenty-four, you were young. What got you to move to Missouri?
Hui: One of my friends was pregnant, so I came to see her. And I felt peaceful. When I sleep in her house, I don’t [feel] scared that someone will come to my house and beat me up, or someone will come in and wake me up and hurt me like my mom [used to]. I actually love this town, and I can do [what] I want. I feel freedom, I feel happiness here.
Sargent: You’ve worked for many years as a waitress, right? Some of it at the waffle house, and you’ve also cleaned houses. Can you talk about that? You’ve met a lot of American families doing that, right? You wait on American families every day, don’t you?
Hui: Yes. And I was not cleaning houses first. One day, I was working in John’s Waffle House and one older gentleman—he was 70 or 80 something years old—was so upset. So I started talking to him, [saying], You OK? He said, No, my house is a mess. My wife, she’s sick, and I don’t have much money for somebody [to] clean my house. So I felt so bad. So I offered him, I can clean your house for free till your wife gets better. He looked at me and was like, For free? I was like, Yeah, sure, I can help you. So he was like, You can help keep my house for free? I said, Yeah, anyway, you say you don’t have much money to pay. You don’t have to pay me, and I can help. So I started helping clean his house for free. And then people started talking about, Oh, Carol, she cleans houses. I was like, No, I do not clean houses. [But he said], Yes. She cleans very good, she doesn’t charge you much. So then people started to come to me and tell me to help them clean houses, from one to one. So that was how I started cleaning houses for people.
Sargent: When you wait tables at the restaurant, you must get to know a lot of American families. You must have gotten to know them pretty well over time, right? Can you talk about that?
Hui: Yes. Yes. I know a lot of people. They tell me about their life story—and sometimes a happy story, sometimes a sad story. So I started to pick up more English—before I was so shy to talk to them—and now when they started talking to me, I started to know more about them, what they need. Sometimes on Thanksgiving, we will bring some food for people and help each other help people, and I [become closer] to everybody who comes to the restaurant.
Sargent: Can I ask, what does it feel like to know that there are all these people out in the town who are hoping that you get released and are rooting for you? Can you talk about what that feels like?
Hui: I’m so appreciate what they do. I’m hope … I don’t know. I so love it, and I’m thankful that they love me so much. And I hope I can see them again. And I will give hugs to every single one. I will give them hugs, kisses, anything I can.
Sargent: Carol, I know that you have three children and you’re separated from them. One of them is 14. Your boy is 14. How old are your other two kids, and what does it feel like to be separated from them?
Hui: It’s hard. I have a 14-year-old—my oldest—son. He’s autistic. He was crying so bad. He’s scared. And one time he said he heard people were asking questions [and somebody said], Oh, your mom’s in jail. He was so scared. He’s scared. Will he not see me again? He doesn’t know what to do. And also, I have a 12-year-old son. He called me, and he told me, Whenever [you] go, can [you] please take me too? And my daughter, she’s 7 years old. Of course, she doesn’t know nothing. And she said, Mom, please come home, please. I miss you. It’s so boring at home. She told me, Mom, nobody tells me bedtime story no more. Mom, give me a hug and kiss me. Mom, I miss you. I need you. I feel so bad. I don’t know what I can do for my children. I don’t want to put this situation [on] them. I just want [them to have a] happy, normal life, a mom and dad to love, [to] do anything, to start school, [to do] anything they want. I just want my kids to not be scared.
Sargent: You don’t want your kids to be scared. We understand that you’re trying to get members of Congress interested in trying to turn this around. Do you have a message for members of Congress and other politicians? Would you like to say something to them?
Hui: Please let me free. I just want to stay here with my children. Please protect me. I’m so sorry. I have a poor English. I don’t know. I just want to [be with] my family with my children, stay here in the U.S. for freedom and have [a] better life.
Sargent: Carol, thank you so much for talking to us. We wish you the best of luck. Hopefully your story will get more attention, and hopefully this will end. Thank you.
Hui: Thank you. Thank you.
Sargent: We’re also talking today to Carol’s lawyer, Raymond Bolourtchi. He’s here with us, and he’s going to explain some of the legal ins and outs of the case. Ray, what happened to Carol exactly, and where are things?
Raymond Bolourtchi: Thanks, Greg, for giving us the time to speak to Ming and to cover the story. Ming came to the U.S. in 2004. She ultimately ended up in removal proceedings, or in deportation proceedings, because she overstayed her visa and the government made certain allegations that were really negative based on her original marriage. She presented an application for asylum to the immigration court. The application was denied. She appealed it to the Board of Immigration Appeals, which again dismissed her, denied her appeal, and went all the way to the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals—the U.S. Court of Appeals. That also dismissed her appeal.
Sargent: You mentioned the previous marriage. I just want to clarify that The New York Times reported that she entered into a paid marriage for the sake of getting legal protection. And as you’ve said, she has regretted that ever since; she was desperate at the time. Can you just give us a short overview of that part of it?
Bolourtchi: Carol received some really poor guidance and really bad advice. Whoever suggested to her.… She was in such a desperate time in her life after all the suffering that she sustained when she was in China. She entered into a marriage, and the marriage was just a sham marriage. And after an investigation was uncovered, that’s what caused her to be discovered by the Department of Homeland Security and placed in deportation proceedings, so to speak. And I’ve known Carol—and I know her as Ming—for so long. I’ve known her since 2007, and I can assure you that a single day doesn’t go by without her regretting following that really ill advice. She was desperate, I cannot stress it enough. Not to justify her conduct, but she’s just so remorseful about it.
Fast-forward, after all her appeals are exhausted, she’s ultimately placed on what we call an order of supervision. The Department of Homeland Security was not in a position to enforce the order removal. Her son was autistic, and she was not eligible for any type of other defense. And she’s been on this order of supervision. I have a lot of clients that are or have been on order of supervision, but she was so adamant: never missed an appointment, never violated any laws as a condition of her supervision. She was just a model foreign national under this program. Every year, [she] was granted an employment authorization dedicated to working and caring for her family, her autistic son. And the order of supervision had been renewed year to year and it was valid until August of this year. Right after January 20 and the executive orders, we started seeing some very dramatic movements, and then she received a call that she needed to report ahead of her reporting date in August 2025. And she showed up the next day as directed. Again, she followed all the rules and every instruction. And that’s when she was taken into custody.
Sargent: They told her that her legal protection she had was canceled and informed her that she’d be deported, correct?
Bolourtchi: Correct. And that the department wanted to enforce the order. Obviously, the administrative, or rather the executive, order said that the department will no longer want to have anyone in an order of supervision. And if you had a final order of deportation, then you needed to be deported. And our whole point in this particular case was that, Look, she’s been a model participant in the program.
Sargent: You and Carol are fighting her deportation. What are the prospects for that succeeding? What are you trying to accomplish?
Bolourtchi: Based on a recent Supreme Court decision not too long ago, we believe that there are changed circumstances that would really warrant the case to be reopened because now Carol has a defense that she did not have at the time when her case was heard. We remain optimistic that the case will be reopened. And obviously, having an autistic child in the U.S., we feel very confident that we would have a really good shot at it, but we have to get this door opened—or reopened rather. We’re hoping that the Board of Immigration Appeals will do that in light of these chain circumstances.
Sargent: So you’re trying to do two things. One is to halt the deportation, which seems to be getting processed as we speak. And then you also want to go back into appeals court—immigration appeals court, I should be clear—and replead her case based on the fact that she has an autistic child, and getting legal protections in the U.S. that are more durable? Is that what you want, and is that possible?
Bolourtchi: Correct. We’ve done both. Both have been filed at the same time. We filed an emergency request that the deportation be stayed for an order preventing the department to put Carol on a flight. And at the same time, we filed a request that her old case will reopen so she can go forward with this new defense now available to her. And obviously, because she has an autistic son, we believe that the facts of the case are strong enough and they’re changed enough that she’s deserving of having this opportunity.
Sargent: Ray, we want to thank you so much, and we want to thank Carol too. Thanks so much for bringing her to us from her jail cell. We wish you the best of luck to both of you.
Bolourtchi: Thank you, and thank you again for shedding so much light on this story. Really appreciate that.