“It’s really hard for women who don’t know anything or don’t have a place to call home,” Grace said. “And these women have no family at all.”
Now some Minnesota lawmakers are trying to make it easier for women who came to Minnesota from Southeast Asia, like Grace, to leave abusive relationships. Rep. Karen Clark, DFL-Minneapolis, and Sen. Alice Johnson, DFL-Blaine, among a handful of others, are introducing a bill this session that would allocate $2 million in state funds to provide rental assistance for victims of domestic violence and sexual abuse in the Asian and Pacific Islander (API) community — something advocacy groups say has been needed for years.