Immigrant's $1.3B Powerball win spotlights the Iu Mien community
SALEM, Ore. (AP) — Cheng “Charlie” Saephan wore a broad smile and a bright blue sash emblazoned with the words “Iu-Mien USA” as he hoisted an oversized check for $1.3 billion above his head.
The 46-year-old immigrant’s luck in winning an enormous Powerball jackpot in Oregon earlier this month — a lump sum payment of $422 million after taxes, which he and his wife will split with a friend — has changed his life. It also raised awareness about Iu Mien people, a southeast Asian ethnic group with origins in China, many of whose members fled from Laos to Thailand and then settled in the U.S. following the Vietnam War.
“I am born in Laos, but I am not Laotian,” Saephan told a news conference Monday at Oregon Lottery headquarters, where his identity as one of the jackpot’s winners was revealed. “I am Iu Mien.”
During the Vietnam War, the CIA and U.S. military recruited Iu Mien in neighboring Laos, many of them subsistence farmers, to engage in guerrilla warfare and to provide intelligence and surveillance to disrupt the Ho Chi Minh Trail that the North Vietnamese used to send troops and weapons through Laos and Cambodia into South Vietnam.
Related articles
EDEN CONFIDENTIAL: Prince Harry's army friend JJ Chalmers urges Kate to talk about cancer
As the Duke of Sussex prepares to return to Britain to attend the tenth anniversary celebrations of2024-05-01Jury selection for Trump's hush money trial could near a close
NEW YORK (AP) — Lawyers worked Friday to round out the panel of 12 jurors and six alternates who wil2024-05-01Gay 30 Rock actor Maulik Pancholy is canceled from anti
A Pennsylvania school board reportedly canceled an anti-bullying talk by 30 Rock actor Maulik Pancho2024-05-01Todd, Julie Chrisley appeal bank fraud and tax evasion convictions
ATLANTA (AP) — Lawyers for reality TV stars Todd and Julie Chrisley, who are in prison after being c2024-05-01Chinese astronauts return to earth after six months in space
BEIJING (AP) — China’s Shenzhou-17 spacecraft returned to Earth Tuesday, carrying three astronauts w2024-05-01Bitcoin halving: Everything you need to know
NEW YORK (AP) — Sometime in the next few days or even hours, the “miners” who chisel bitcoins out of2024-05-01
atest comment