Editor’s note: David A. Andelman is a CNN contributor, two-time Deadline Club Award winner, a Knight of the French Legion of Honour, and the author of .Red lines in the sand: A history of diplomacy, strategy, and potential wars” and SubStack’s blog Andelman unleashed. He previously served as foreign correspondent and bureau chief for the New York Times’ Europe and Asia region and CBS News in Paris. The views expressed in this commentary are his own.view more opinions on CNN
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I have lived in France for about 44 years, sometimes permanently, but more often regularly, always in the same building, around the corner from the Musée d’Orsay, across the Seine. there is. Tuileries.
I never had to choose whether or not to make it my forever home. Now, we, along with many of our fellow Americans, are considering just such a move.
In an increasing number of cases, the reason can be traced back to one close source: the former president. Donald Trump. More precisely, how he tore apart America and our democracy, which I cherished for nearly 80 years on this earth.
And as I began to ask more widely about this concern than ever before, my wife, Pamela, and I realized that we were never alone.
“The first thing they say is, ‘Get me out of here.’ [America]” Adrian Leeds said. For a quarter of a century, she has advised primarily Americans looking to move to France on how to find a place to live through her real estate agency, Adrian Lees Group. “But now we’re really seeing more young people saying, ‘I don’t want to raise my kids in this country.’ We really want to give our kids the best. And we’re so unhappy.” she said to me.
And that trend seems to only be accelerating. “We are up 100%, doubling our financial year from January to March over a year ago,” Lees continued. “It’s happening so fast, the numbers are unbelievable. Every day I hear voices saying, ‘Get rid of me!’ ”
Of course, France is not the only country where such discussions are taking place. “At the beginning of 2020, Americans made up 5% of our customers; today, they’re 70%,” said Patricia Casabri, CEO of London-based luxury migration consultancy Global Citizen Solutions. he said in a Zoom interview from Dubai. And these days, she added, the number of Americans “is only increasing.”
To be sure, there are reasons for Americans to move beyond the prospect of a second term for Trump. “When you have a school shooting, it just triggers people to act on something they’ve been thinking about for a while,” Casabri said. But, he added, “political agendas definitely have an impact on people.”
Tony Khan, a veteran former PBS and NPR producer, was sitting in a Mexico City hotel lobby earlier this month making just such a calculation.
“At the very moment you’re asking me, I have mixed feelings about whether America is my country,” he says during my supposedly not-so-temporary Zoom conversation between Paris and Mexico City. Khan said. When Khan was younger, he said, “Basically, when America didn’t want us, Mexico let us in. That’s the fact. “It was the home of the members,” he said.
In 1950, at the age of eight, Khan and his family were summoned by the feared House Un-American Activities Committee for his father, famed Hollywood screenwriter Gordon Khan, for his ties to communism and the film industry. They all fled to Mexico. He ultimately never testified.
His father was pursued by J. Edgar Hoover and the FBI until near the end of his life at age 62. Now, Khan worries that a similar danger may not be too far away.
“There is a sense of safety and belonging in Mexico,” Khan continued. “I’m not afraid of strangers getting violent.” [at me] I’m there because I’m Jewish. “At the same time, I’m not obsessed with feeling like I need to get out of America now before it’s too late, but I’m getting close to it,” he said.
Over the past six months, he has traveled to Mexico City five times with his wife as they prepare for their final decision.
There are many ways to escape. Some simply seek a haven where they can work and live freely, without an immediate need to acquire a second nationality. France, for example, has a wide range of options, from a simple visa that allows you to stay for more than 90 days out of a 180-day period under European regulations, to a carte des residences (renewable every 10 years).
In most countries, like France, taking the next leap toward citizenship also requires learning the language and customs.
Additionally, there are ‘golden passports’ in some countries where a wide range of categories and levels of investment can be a shortcut to citizenship, and ‘talent passports’ where you bring unique personal abilities to the table.
“Many people now know what the Trump administration is like and realize more than ever that the door to living in another country is open and that it’s not as difficult as they thought. ” said the Paris-based immigration agency. Attorney Daniel Tostado told me:
Eight years ago, at the very beginning of Trump’s rise to the presidency, Skyler Schmanski became one of the Americans making a choice. He had come to France to study at the business school in Marseille. Now he plans to stay.
“I started experiencing the quality of life here,” he told me. “Whether it’s education or health care, those things start to become more true when you’re in your 30s and start entering the next chapter of your life,” he says. Now with his wife, career, and eventual French citizenship, he believes he made the right choice.
Schmanski recalls two notebook problems that were very compelling. “In the middle of the night, I stood up under a cupboard that I didn’t realize was open above me. I cracked my head open, saw blood, fainted, woke up and thought, ‘Maybe I should go to the hospital.’ As a good American, I said, “No, I don’t want to go to the hospital.” You don’t need a $20,000 bill. ”
“But my girlfriend (now wife) said, ‘Go to the hospital and your insurance will cover it.’ And I left with 15 euros. [$16] invoice. Wow 15 euros. To sew the head. So I said, “Wait a minute.” Maybe there’s something wrong with the system here. ”
Then there was graduate school. “I spent the equivalent of $15,000 to attend a very good master’s business school in 15 months,” Schmanski said.
For now, the most popular destinations for Americans looking for an escape seem to be Spain, Portugal and Greece, according to Global Citizen Solutions’ Casabri. She added that Italy was a popular choice at one time, but suggested that Italy became more popular with the arrival of the hard right. Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has left some Americans wondering if they are risking going from the frying pan to the fire.
For my wife and I, moving permanently to France isn’t that big of a leap. It is simply an extension of the time I spend in France today, as is the case with many others.
But will the next generation of Americans also see their future elsewhere? “The conversation we used to have with Americans was, ‘Should I go to Europe and retire?'” But now the profile of people is much different, with younger families and younger families. “We are working hard,” Casabri said.
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“So at some point there will be a cost to the country in terms of losing not only income taxpayers but also talented young professionals,” she added.
“All of a sudden, Americans find themselves in a situation where they feel like they don’t know who their neighbors are, who their family is,” concluded Casabri, who is Brazilian and now lives in London.
“I don’t think it really matters what side of the political spectrum you’re on. I think everyone is reevaluating everything a little bit,” she said.
For us, much will depend on the nature of President Trump’s pledge to assume the role of dictator for the day. As Pamela says, “It depends on how safe we feel in the kind of country he promises, a country that is no longer a democracy.”
