Project 2025: Seal the Border
To Seal = to secure against access, leakage, or passage in or out (Scroll to the end to listen)
And one city became two.
On 13 August, 1961, the sun rose on a new Berlin, a city divided into east and west by construction of the Berlin Wall. Communism, not fascism, ruled East Germany, but both are oppressive regimes. To function, they require subjugated people. Strongmen don’t look so tough when people choose to flee.
Around 1,000 East Germans a day were escaping to the west. The Berlin Wall was constructed to seal that human leak. According to History.com, it was effective:
Before the wall was built, Berliners on both sides of the city could move around fairly freely: They crossed the East-West border to work, to shop, to go to the theater and the movies. Trains and subway lines carried passengers back and forth. After the wall was built, it became impossible to get from East to West Berlin except through one of three checkpoints: at Helmstedt (“Checkpoint Alpha” in American military parlance), at Dreilinden (“Checkpoint Bravo”) and in the center of Berlin at Friedrichstrasse (“Checkpoint Charlie”). (Eventually, the GDR built 12 checkpoints along the wall.) At each of the checkpoints, East German soldiers screened diplomats and other officials before they were allowed to enter or leave. Except under special circumstances, travelers from East and West Berlin were rarely allowed across the border.
Source: History.com
Project 2025 is unambiguous with regard to immigration (and emigration.) The framers recommend tearing up our existing federal policies and starting over with Christo-fascist laws.
The solution to all of the above problems is not to tinker with this or that government program, to replace this or that bureaucrat. These are problems not of technocratic efficiency but of national sovereignty and constitutional governance. We solve them not by trimming and reshaping the leaves but by ripping out the trees—root and branch.
Project 2025, pages 12 - 13
In my newsletter on Project 2025’s Promise 3, I covered the Biblical origin of “ripping out the trees—root and branch.” This Biblical imagery makes Old Testament God the root of our laws, including those for immigration.
17 And if some of the branches be broken off, and thou, being a wild olive tree, wert grafted in among them, and with them partakest of the root and fatness of the olive tree; 18 Boast not against the branches. But if thou boast, thou bearest not the root, but the root thee.
Romans 11:17-18 KJV
Project 2025 Promise 3: Defend our Nation's Sovereignty, Borders, and Bounty Against Global Threats
Though far-right Republicans complain about the southern border, the Project 2025 text below doesn’t target our border with Mexico. Its overarching statement simply refers to “the border,” which means ALL borders: by land, by sea, and by air.
Illegal immigration should be ended, not mitigated; the border sealed, not reprioritized.
Project 2025, page 13
Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary offers this tertiary definition of the verb “to seal:”
To close or make secure against access, leakage, or passage by a fastening or coating.
To seal means nothing comes in and nothing goes out.
The mainstream media has spent much time dissecting Project 2025’s anti-immigration policies. We’ve read about detention camps and forced deportations. Christo-fascist Republicans will create a nation hostile to all non-white immigrant populations.
But the charge to “seal the border” doesn’t only apply to immigrants. Think about what a Christo-fascist Republican win could mean for Americans traveling abroad for holidays or looking to emigrate. The goal to “seal the border” could impact American emigrants, too.
What if you had to endure a lengthy government review process to undertake your dream honeymoon to Italy with your new wife? Including answering questions about your sex life and forcing her to submit to a detailed gynecologic exam?
Or imagine you’re transgender. Your only option for continuing your now illegal hormone treatments is to travel to Mexico. But to have your next trip approved, you must meet with a government official and provide detailed justification for your trip. Once he discovers you are trans, he reports you to the CDC and revokes your passport.
There is a mass shooting at your daughter’s school. She is physically uninjured but suffers PTSD and requires extensive therapy. Because you run your own online business, you and your husband decide to emigrate to Ireland. You’re all relieved that your daughter will be able to finish school in a safer environment. Only the US government official refuses to issue her passport or approve your move. According to him, “gun violence” is not an acceptable reason to permanently leave the country.
Or you’re a woman of child-bearing age. A government official denies your family’s request for a trip to Paris because you may become pregnant on the trip, and the stress of travel could endanger the unborn child.
These scenarios may seem hyperbolic or hysterical, but they represent the kinds of restrictions authoritarian governments have imposed on their citizenry in the past. Several red states already restrict free movement for minors seeking abortions and trans procedures in other states. Many red state attorneys general are threatening to restrict interstate travel even further.
Iran does this exact same thing with their own citizens trying to travel abroad on vacation, to see family, for work........Iran absolutely controls who is allowed to leave and who is denied, including taking their passport if needed.
I read Russia did the same thing to the men of military age..... article said their passports were stripped from them to prevent them from defecting, leaving the country.
The stance you've described -- no one in or out -- puzzles me. If "undesirables" want to leave the country, why not let them? Why force them (us) to stay?