Axios co-founder Mike Allen appeared on Monday's Morning Joe to tout the outlet's article, "Trump's identity project," which begins [emphasis added]:
"Through immigration crackdowns and cultural purges, President Trump is wielding government power to enforce a more rigid, exclusionary definition of what it means to be American."
Allen cites as an example:
"We see this in a new question for citizenship applications, an assessment of whether they're of good moral character."
Uh, Mike, hello? That "new" question has been around since 1790, in our country's very first naturalization law. It reads:
"The court admitting such alien shall be satisfied that he has resided within the limits and under the jurisdiction of the United States five years; and it shall further appear to their satisfaction, that during that time, he has behaved as a man of a good moral character, attached to the principles of the constitution of the United States, and well disposed to the good order and happiness of the same."
The Axios article doesn't make the total misrepresentation that Allen did, that the good moral character requirement is "new," but does claim that the Trump admin is "expanding" the requirement, "tying the vague standard to an individual's 'behavior, adherence to societal norms, and positive contributions.'"
But the original 1790 statute's requirement that an applicant be "attached to the principles of the constitution of the United States, and well disposed to the good order and happiness of the same" is entirely consistent with what the Trump admin is saying.
The good moral character requirement is not being expanded— it's being applied.
But it's clear that the Left doesn't want to keep "Death to America" types out of America. They welcome them in by the boatload. They don't want "viewpoint-based discrimination"...or do they? MSNBC rushed to oppose (presumably racist) white South Africans being imported as refugees.
Note: Allen also fretted over the Trump administration's emphasis on Western civilization, and visa applicants "being checked for anti-American ideologies."
Just yesterday, we caught Christina Greer, another MSNBC guest, describing America as being:
"Predicated on white supremacy, anti-black racism, patriarchy, and capitalism . . . Let's be clear, our history is filled with murder. We are a bellicose nation. It's filled with rapes and exclusion."
As he was running for office, and then about to become president, Barack Obama said: "Let us transform this nation . . . We are five days away from fundamentally transforming the United States of America.” Obama didn't like the America he saw, and felt it needed fundamental transformation.
In contrast with Greer and Obama, Trump sees America and Western civilization as fundamentally good, and wants to emphasize that. You gotta problem with that, Mike? We know the answer.
Here's the transcript.
MSNBC
Morning Joe
8/25/25
6:38 am EDTMIKA BRZEZINSKI: Well, Mike Allen, Axios has new reporting on Trump's vision for America, in a new piece entitled "Trump's Identity Project." It reads in part, quote, the MAGA movement's obsession with American identity and Western civilization is shaping federal policy far more than in Trump's first term, fueling a reckoning over who belongs, and what history should be remembered.
Tell us more about that report.MIKE ALLEN: Yeah, Mika and Joe, thank you for taking a personal interest in this important story. And what we're seeing is a much more rigid definition of what it means to be an American.
This is being pollinated and enforced by the Trump administration, and proudly so. They will tell you that they are doing this. So where in the past Americans would talk a lot about diversity being our strength, in the second term, we're hearing much more about Western civilization, about American identity.
And why this matters is that this is an operationalization of the vision that President Trump has been talking about as long as you've known him, as long as he's been running.
Great reporting in this story by my colleagues, Tal Axelrod and Zach Basu. This operationalization includes museums, where we see the Smithsonian being scrubbed for alignment with American ideals. We see this in applications for visas where the applicants are being checked for anti-American ideologies.
And third, we see this in a new question for citizenship applications, an assessment of whether they're of good moral character. And what the White House says about this is people want to be proud of America. People want to have pride in America. And I can tell you that the MAGA folks in my inbox and in my conversation say, this is what we voted for.
