Conditional Citizens: On Belonging in America

This essay opens with an anecdote about Lalami and two friends passing through a US Border Patrol inspection point in California. In 1952, these inspection points were set up within 25 miles of the border, but their range subsequently increased up to 100 miles from the border. Lalami notes that 200 million Americans live within this limit and could be subject to search at any time. El Paso, Texas, and Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, used to share a border, but when a wall was erected between them, El Paso improved, while Ciudad Juarez declined. Lalami notes that border control measures are relatively new; she writes that since they began to increase in severity in 1993, they have been effective only in redirecting immigration traffic and harming potential immigrants.

Discussing President Trump’s rhetoric before and during his time in office, Lalami notes that he deepened a division in which non-Americans are portrayed as dishonest, lazy, or criminal, in opposition to Americans, who are depicted as hardworking and honest. This distinction becomes racial as Lalami comments on the distinction between the harsh border control at the southern border with Mexico and the light border patrolling along the northern border with Canada, even though lethal drugs such as fentanyl and ecstasy enter the US via the northern border.