Make America Safe Again. En WPR-analys av Donald Trumps framställning av illegal immigration vid USAs södra gräns

Sammanfattning: In today’s globalised world characterised by transnational flows of goods, capital and people, borders are seemingly becoming obsolete. Simultaneously, some politicians are favouring protectionist and nationalist policies. When Donald Trump during his presidential campaign announced that one of his primary objectives was the wall construction on the US-Mexican border, he set the tone for the immigration discourse and border policy that would come to characterise his campaign and presidency. Using Bacchi’s discourse analytical approach What’s the Problem Represented to be? along with Callahan’s Politics of Walls, this essay identifies and analyses problem representations that form the basis of Donald Trump’s portrayal of (illegal) (im)migration to the United States. This is done by analysing three documents identified as central for the formation of Trump’s immigration discourse. Furthermore, the essay examines the tendency that as economic borders loosen, sociocultural borders tighten. The findings show that (illegal) (im)migration in these documents is primarily portrayed as an economic issue, as a threat against the USA as a nation state, and as a humanitarian crisis. Results also show that Trump nurses an essentialist, negative narrative when speaking about (illegal) (im)migrants, presenting the wall as a way of protecting the American nation-body from the vicious Other.