Global Stories

**Bridget Bergen** (0:10)
It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning again, everyone. I'm Bridget Bergen, sitting in for Brian today. As the United States approaches its 250th anniversary on Saturday, all this week, the BBC's podcast The Global Story is exploring the surprising and often hidden ways the United States has shaped the modern world. One of the most powerful and enduring American exports, the American dream. Millions have moved to the United States with the idea that if you work hard enough, success is possible. One of them is Abdi Noor Iftin, who taught himself English by watching Arnold Schwarzenegger movies in war-torn Somalia, won the US visa lottery and built a new life in Maine about 12 years ago. But the door he walked through is narrowing. On his first day back in the office in January 2025, President Trump signed an order suspending asylum at the southern border, something no prior president had done.
Legal asylum entries at the southwest border collapsed from nearly 40,000 in December 2024 to 26 in February 2025, according to the libertarian think tank, the Cato Institute. Just last week, as covered on this show, the Supreme Court ruled six to three that the government can turn asylum seekers away at the border.
So as we celebrate 250 years of the American Dream this Saturday, my guest has been asking, is it fading? Longtime NPR reporter Asma Khalid is now the co-host of the BBC's The Global Story, and she joins us now. Asma, welcome back to WNYC.

**Asma Khalid** (1:50)
Thank you. It's a pleasure. And I just want to say, it's a pleasure being in conversation with you. I know we've had you when I was hosting the politics podcast on the show in the past. So I love that the tables are turned. Thank you for having me.

**Bridget Bergen** (2:01)
Well, thank you. I'm so glad you're here. And I want to invite our listeners to join this conversation as well. We want to hear about your American dream. Did you or did your parents or did your grandparents come here chasing it? And did they find it? And do you think the American dream still exists or is it fading? Call us and tell us your story. The number 212-433-WNYC.
That's 212-433-9692.
You can call or text that number. Asma, the podcast is marking the 250th anniversary, asking what America has given the world. But this morning's latest episode kind of flips it and asks what the world has hoped to get from America. Why did you build this series around someone like Abdi Noriften, rather than around a president or a policy?

**Asma Khalid** (2:54)
Yeah. I mean, look, I think there are rightfully so, so much. There's a lot of fantastic journalism being done. From a domestic perspective, that looks at our founding fathers, that looks at how the United States has evolved over the last 250 years. On The Global Story, we tend to dive deep every single day on one big story that looks at where the world and America meet.
As we were having editorial conversations, we're a transatlantic team, so I'm still based here in Washington DC, but I have a co-host in London and a lot of colleagues who live in Europe. We have this conversation of how can we tell the story of the United States. One of the things that I will say I think is really eye-opening to me as an American is hearing from some of my European colleagues about how much American culture, American politics has shaped the world over the last several decades.
That's what we did. That's what we tried to do all week in this series. We tell the stories of tiny things like a 60-degree screw that was made, manufactured in the United States, how that reshaped manufacturing all over the world. As you mentioned, the American dream, that's what we dug into today. In many ways, I would say that is because I see the American dream as perhaps the most successful export that the United States has ever sold the world. I mean, it is this intoxicating promise of a better, freer, richer life. It is something that many of us here in the United States over the years have believed in that we can talk about that because I think some sentiments around that are fading away. But millions of people have come to the United States shores with the belief that if you work hard, anything is possible.

**Bridget Bergen** (4:32)
Well, let's take a moment to listen to about a minute and 22 seconds from this morning's episode, which is entitled Abdi's American Dream.

**Abdi Noor Iftin** (4:43)
Fireworks. This is one of the shocking things about America to me, fireworks. Because I have a trauma about gun sounds and stuff like that.