In his last speech in January 1989, the Republican President Ronald Reagan painted a picture of America as a “shining city on a hill,” a beacon of hope and opportunity where anyone, from any corner of the world, could come and embrace the dream of becoming an American. Reagan shared a poignant observation from a letter he had received:
“You can go to live in France, but you cannot become a Frenchman. You can go to live in Germany or Turkey or Japan, but you cannot become a German, a Turk, or a Japanese. But anyone, from any corner of the Earth, can come to live in America and become an American.”
This sentiment encapsulated the nation’s unique openness and inclusivity. Reagan also recounted a touching story about an East German man who had been a prisoner of war in the United States. While working on farms in Oklahoma and California, the man described that time as the happiest of his life. Reagan’s America was a land where even former adversaries could find hope, happiness, and dignity.
“Even a man from a nation once at war with the United States, held here as a prisoner, could fall in love with America”.
Fast-forward 36 years, and the landscape could not look more different. On January 20, 2025, during his inaugural address, another Republican President, Donald Trump, set a starkly contrasting tone. His words outlined an America besieged by threats from abroad, focusing on illegal immigration, crime, and border security:
“It fails to protect our magnificent, law-abiding American citizens but provides sanctuary and protection for dangerous criminals, many from prisons and mental institutions that have illegally entered our country from all over the world. We have a government that has given unlimited funding to the defense of foreign borders but refuses to defend American borders, or more importantly, its own people.”
Trump announced a sweeping series of executive orders aimed at what he called the “complete restoration of America” and a “revolution of common sense.” Among these actions was the abolition of birthright citizenship, a cornerstone of American law since the 14th Amendment. He declared a national emergency at the southern border, reinstated the “Remain in Mexico” policy, and pledged to end the practice of “catch and release.” Trump also vowed to repatriate millions of undocumented immigrants and invoked the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 to crack down on foreign criminal networks, stating:
“We will begin the process of returning millions and millions of criminal aliens back to the places from which they came. Under the orders I sign today, we will also be designating the cartels as foreign terrorist organizations. And by invoking the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, I will direct our government to use the full and immense power of federal and state law enforcement to eliminate the presence of all foreign gangs and criminal networks bringing devastating crime to U.S. soil.”
These measures represent a fundamental shift in how America defines itself. Where Reagan championed an open and inclusive nation, Trump’s vision emphasizes exclusion, security, and an “America First” ethos. Beyond the constitutional challenges these policies will inevitably face, the broader issue is what this shift means for America’s global identity.
The allure of America has always been tied to its promise of opportunity—a land where anyone could start fresh and achieve success through hard work. By narrowing its definition of belonging and closing its doors to the world, the U.S. risks losing the very appeal that made it a global leader. As Reagan warned in his farewell address, without its openness, America faces an “inevitable decline,” leaving space for other nations—some of them authoritarian and undemocratic—to fill the vacuum in the global imagination.
The danger is that the American Dream, once the world’s brightest symbol of hope, could fade into an authoritarian nightmare. If the U.S. forfeits its role as a beacon of opportunity and freedom, it may be replaced by powers that prioritize force over democracy, control over liberty. The question now is whether America can reconcile these two visions of itself or if it will allow fear and exclusivity to extinguish the light of its shining city on a hill.
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