What Nationalists Don't Understand: America Is An Idea

It doesn’t matter if your ancestors sailed over on the Mayflower or your parents trekked across Peru, America belongs to you just as much as it belongs to anyone else.

I recently discovered that an old childhood friend of mine has become a right-wing influencer. Like many of our generation, he has taken to Twitter to share his political commentary, espousing views that are catagorically nationalist and profoundly un-American. The young MAGA crowd does not write about policy or economics, instead they attract attention for their cruelty and crude comedy. When a video surfaced of ICE agents violently detaining two Honduran men in Indianapolis—dragging them from their van, tasers drawn—my former friend’s response was not concern. Of course not. It was a harsh endorsement:

"This is what we voted for. More of this please."

And he is right. This is what many Americans voted for. Many Americans would prefer that our country shed its liberal democracy, abandon the American Dream, and transform into an authoritarian ethno-state. This is the simple reality of our republic today, a horrific detachment from Ronald Reagan’s declarations that America is “A nation forever young, forever bursting with energy and new ideas, and always on the cutting edge, always leading the world to the next frontier, thanks to each wave of new arrivals to this land of opportunity.” Reagan claimed, “If we ever closed the door to new Americans, our leadership in the world would soon be lost.”

This sentiment is incompatible with the modern MAGA nationalist, who believes, as my former friend does,

“Scoring well on a test about the federalist papers doesn’t make you American. America is not an idea or a multiple choice exam.”

But this is wrong. America IS an idea. America is the greatest political experiment the world has ever seen. We allow anyone, regardless of race, religion, gender, origin, or creed, the opportunity to work hard and provide a better life for their kids. It doesn’t matter if your ancestors sailed over on the Mayflower or your parents trekked across Peru, America belongs to you just as much as it belongs to anyone else. As Leon Wieseltier puts it:

“There is no chronological requirement in the American theory of belonging. Previousness should confer no privilege.”

So yes, America is an idea. If you read the Federalist papers you might understand that.