After the Last Border:Two Families and the Story of Refuge in America

The Immigration Act of 1924 limited the number of immigrants from each country to 2% “of the population of each of the countries represented in the US during the 1890 census” (98). Since 1890 preceded the large waves of immigration from Southern Europe, policymakers rigged the system to allow more people from northern Europe and to “almost completely” exclude “arrivals from Asia, South America, the Middle East—and of course the entire continent of Africa” (98). This law, consistent with an exclusive form of American identity, restricted access for most refugees in the world.

The Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 overhauled the American system of immigration, ending the racially based quota system. It established refugee resettlement, merit-based acceptance policies, and family reunification as pillars of immigration policy. Grounded in a more diverse identity and passed in the civil rights era, this law injected American values of human rights and justice into policy. Hasna depended on its promise of family reunification, only to be disappointed.

Indochinese boat people included Vietnamese, Cambodian, Laotian, and Hmong peoples and were “part of one of the largest mass migrations of political refugees and economic migrants in history” (187). Since the American public identified with them and sympathized with their plight, this group of refugees would contribute to the creation of a permanent and stable program of refugee resettlement, from which Mu Naw’s family would later benefit.

In the early 20th century, liberalizers sought to expand access to the US for immigrants. In the ensuing debates over immigration, liberalizers sought to expand opportunities for refugees and immigrants to come to the US. Goudeau depicts immigration policy as the product of a struggle between liberalizers and restrictionists.

Non-refoulement is a core tenet of the UN’s Refugee Convention, which the US has signed. It “states that countries cannot send asylum seekers or refugees back to any country in which they face threats to their life or freedom” (20). The travel ban instituted in 2017 was a direct challenge to this agreement.

A refugee, according to US law, is someone “located outside” of the US and of “special humanitarian concern” to the US, who “demonstrates that they were persecuted or fear persecution due to race, religion, nationality, political opinion, or membership in a particular social group”; is not “firmly resettled in another country”; and is “admissible’” to the US (191). Both Mu Naw and Hasna met this definition. Although the rest of Hasna’s family did as well, they were not given entry.

Restrictionists seek to make entry to the US more difficult for refugees and other immigrants. They dominated immigration policy before World War II and again during the Trump presidency. Fresh restrictions, put in place by the Trump administration, prevented Hasna’s adult children from coming to the US.