Krys Lee’s How I Became a North Korean (2016) describes North Korean refugees’ border-crossing experiences and resettlement processes. Reading the different journeys of the text’s three main protagonists—Danny, Yongju, Jangmi—this paper argues that the model minority idea centralizes their transformation from refugees to citizens within the host countries. By internalizing and embodying the qualities expected of the model minority, these characters are considered deserving of new citizenship, as they support their host countries’ national values and identity. William Peterson’s understanding of “good citizenship” was suggested to understand and praise Asian Americans’ success despite their hardships as recent migrants. His notion established the Asian American model minority figure as hardworking but politically silent. The idea generates stereotypes, and isolates Asian Americans from society. Focusing on Peterson’s problematic notion, the paper will first explore how ​​each character within Lee’s novel embodies and performs an iteration of the model minority figure. In particular, Danny becomes a model US citizen, and Yongju represents a model North Korean refugee in South Korea. By comparison, Jangmi wishes to remain invisible, only hoping to forget the past. By examining why Jangmi’s different refugee experience prevents her from becoming a model North Korean refugee, this paper problematizes the model minority idea as exclusive and exclusionary. Further, this paper critiques how new citizens in host countries are burdened with pre-configurations of the model minority figure, and proposes that these both marginalize and oppressively silence difference and diversity.