Stepping into a Political Metaphor – at an Airport

You step off a plane, and you walk into a political metaphor. 

We were returning from three weeks in London, arriving at O’Hare Airport in Chicago before transferring to our flight to St. Louis. The British Airways plane had been late leaving London, but we made up for most of the lost time in flight. We taxied a bit in Chicago, a bit defined as taking the grand tour of O’Hare Airport. But we finally deplaned.

 

The entry hall was chaos. As the signs indicated, non-US citizens were directed to one section of roped aisles, and US citizens to another. 

 

I wasn’t worried. We had a three-hour+ layover in Chicago, and I had completed the Mobile Passport Control from on the US Customs and Border Protection app, which – in theory – would help speed the process. And sure enough, an agent directed the MPC people around the lengthy line for US citizens. But as we walked around, I couldn’t help but notice that the number of US citizens in the US citizen look looked few and far between.

 

What MPC allowed us to do, however, was only break into the line, with a lot of hostile looks from those already waiting. And I was right: the line wasn’t only US citizens. In fact, there were hardly any US citizens in the US citizens’ line. The crush of non-citizen visitors was so large that they had started moving them into the US citizen line, and they overwhelmed it. Ahead of me was a woman with an Egyptian passport, and ahead of her was a woman from China with a whole sheaf of immigration papers. She was behind a family emigrating from some Middle Eastern country. And there were almost all non-citizens ahead of them.

 

One woman, a US citizen, relied upon the kindness of strangers to advance in the line so she could try to catch a connecting flight. Others were becoming increasingly vexed. I thought a couple in an adjacent line were going to become unglued and lose control right there.

 

We waited in line for an hour. When we finally reached the agent, we spent all of 60 seconds answering the questions I had already filled out on the form. Which she knew: she had my submitted form on the screen in front of her. She waved us through with the CBP authorized form. 

 

We raced to retrieve our bags. Then we had to take the train from the International Terminal to the Terminal with our flight to St. Louis. The crowds to board the train were dense; we had to wait for the next train. We made it to our gate just as the flight was boarding. Our 3+-hour layover had disappeared.

 

The CBP could have easily reduced the lines considerably by segregating US citizens, like they were supposed to. But the point was made: US citizens have no more right to enter the United States than anyone else. 

 

Lessons learned:

 

If at all possible, avoid Chicago O’Hare if you’re arriving on an international flight. We’ve come back from Europe many times, and we’ve never had that kind of experience.

 

If you travel frequently to and from the US, enroll in Global Entry, where you scan your passport. It’s similar to the system Britain generally has for visitors; entry through Border Control at Heathrow Airport took us less than about 30 seconds. 

 

And expect our government to treat US and non-US citizens alike, regardless of the inconvenience or the cost. That’s just how it is these days. 

 

Photograph of an O’Hare Airport terminal by Karson via Unsplash. Used with permission.

Some Monday Readings

 

Shoreline – artwork by Sonja Benskin Mesher.

 

Jonathan Edwards: Founding Father of American Political Thought – Gordon Arnold at The imaginative Conservative.

 

First Draft, Last Draft: How Hemingway Became Hemingway – Joel Miller at Miller’s Book Review.

 

Why Canada is Destroying Its Churches – Samuel Sey at Slow to Write.

 

Helene: the have and the have-nots – Brian Miller at A South Roane Agrarian.