I’m 56. Maybe I’m misreading the moment, but I’ve never experienced America as a “once you get here, you’re safe forever” culture.

America isn’t home base. It’s not olly olly oxen free. It’s not crossing the plate and the game stops. It’s more like making it onto the field. That’s when the real work begins.

For some people, getting here already required enormous sacrifice—months of travel, exploitation, danger, debt, stolen savings, physical risk. The journey itself can be brutal. And that reality deserves respect, not dismissal.

But structurally, arrival has never meant insulation.

Historically, the United States guarantees legal status, due process, and protection from foreign tyranny. It offers refuge and extraordinary liberty. It does not promise economic stability, cultural cushioning, or lifelong institutional guardianship.

In many cases, once you arrive, you’re starting from zero. You have to build something from nothing. That’s not cruelty—it’s the nature of a high-liberty, high-risk system.

The safety net exists, but it’s low. There’s no universal baseline that guarantees you won’t struggle. The upside can be extraordinary. The downside is real. That volatility is part of the design.

Even the Statue of Liberty poem—deeply compassionate—speaks of breathing free. It promises a door. It does not promise that once you step through it, the grind disappears.

America has always been sink-or-swim. You get a shot. You don’t get home base.

That’s not anti-immigrant. It’s not anti-American.

It’s just a sober reading of how the system operates.