ABSTRACT Transnational organizations are primarily studied from the perspective of first-generation migrants and how cross-border interactions shape their identities. This study focusses on transnational activism among the second-generation, the children of refugees, asking how refugee status affects second-generation transnationalism. By analysing the case study of Vietnamese refugees in the United States, the largest refugee re-settlement effort in American history, the article analyses an originally curated database of transnational organizations (n = 632), as well as a survey of 80 organizational leaders. Findings show that participation in transnational organizations offers new ways of understanding one’s identity and social mobility in the United States and in Vietnam. This transnational point of reference includes transnational labour market opportunities and the transforming of identities from learning about silenced histories in refugee families. Transnational activism creates an alternative reference category for integration outside the common reference groups including intergenerational mobility, native co-ethnics, and the general US population.