Purple Heart Veteran Self-Deports After ICE Threatens Arrest at Check-In

Sae Joon Park, a Purple Heart recipient who served in the U.S. Park, who had been living in the country since age 7 on a green card that was later revoked, had been granted deferred action on a removal order in 2011 based on his military service.

He now lives on Camp Humphreys, a U.S. Army garrison south of Seoul. Park told CNN that spending time on the base, with its American chain restaurants and soldiers in uniform, provides a temporary sense of home.

He returned to South Korea, the country of his birth, for the first time since childhood after the June 2025 encounter with immigration officials. Park is among veterans affected by the current administration's immigration enforcement policies. At age 7, Park traveled alone from South Korea to Miami to join his mother following his parents' divorce.

The family later moved to Los Angeles, where he grew up in Koreatown and the San Fernando Valley. After high school, he enlisted in the Army at the suggestion of his uncle, a South Korean Marine colonel. In October 1989, Park was stationed at Fort Clayton in Panama.

He participated in Operation Just Cause, which the Army described at the time as its largest combat operation since the Vietnam War. During a raid on a house linked to Manuel Noriega, a firefight erupted and Park was shot twice in the spine and lower back. He was airlifted to a hospital in San Antonio, where he received a Purple Heart in a bedside ceremony.

Park said he survived the injuries but struggled with what he later recognized as post-traumatic stress disorder upon returning to civilian life. He said loud noises triggered panic attacks and nightmares, leading him to use marijuana and then harder drugs. Park's drug use contributed to legal problems.