This is not about me. People who know me know that I am too shy to stand the spotlight. But I feel a sort of urge to share my personal experience as America, my country of adoption since 1983, turned 250.

I was so dedicated to my new homeland, the United States, that has given me a lot, and busy raising my American children, feeling so American deep in my heart that I was content to be a permanent resident for decades, until 2019, 36 years after the start of my American experience. Then, my son Samir and his spouse felt that the evil man now at the White House might just one day take away that privilege from us all, green card holders. So, I became an American also on paper in 2019, sitting in the first row, embarrassingly emotional, as I became a member of “the land of the free and the home of the brave”–a phrase from the U.S. National Anthem.

In reaction to the inhumane treatment of immigrants and the wave of xenophobia re-ignited by Donald Trump, it would be easy for legal immigrants like me to feel unappreciated by a country most of us have served in various capacities—and maybe even hate it. Though understandable, such a reaction would be unwise in my view because these United States of America is the greatest nation on Earth and is poised to remain so for a long time.

You need no lecture on the significance of immigration in the nation of immigrants that is the United States. Let me, however, salute the Latino undocumented workers, a critical economic backbone in the U.S. numbering in the millions; give a shoutout to the millions of information technology experts from India and Pakistan; and acknowledge the contribution of a Dikembe Mutombo from The Congo to the game of basketball, and the dedication of hundreds of African immigrants who routinely save American lives as doctors, nurses and firefighters, or protect us against terror.

Some of these people came here—let’s call it what it is—out of desperation, running away from misery back in their countries. Others like me came in pursuit of advanced education or ways to advance in their profession. In a country where, as people often say, the sky is the limit, most of us have been fulfilled.

With a bachelor’s degree in English literature and American civilization at the National University of Dahomey, followed by a master’s degree in African Studies and American civilization at the National University of Cote d’Ivoire, I secured a well-paying job at an American embassy in West Africa where I was the only college graduate and the youngest but most senior staff member. Rising from a family that is not wealthy, I used my own hard-earned money saved over nearly a decade to come and pursue my studies in one of America’s most prestigious universities, The Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies, in Washington, D.C. in 1983.

Then, like a rock dropping from the sky, I abruptly got my chance at the American dream! I was one class away from graduating when the Voice of America, V.O.A. (the U.S. government’s radio that broadcasts to the rest of the world), hired me, offering a salary so juicy I couldn’t frown on it. Thankfully, it was in the summer, and I was able to take summer classes after work.

I was hired to edit the daily news feed that was broadcast to radio stations across Africa which, in turn, used it; but, before I knew it, I was editing on the side a feature of my own that I titled—quite pompously, I admit— “African Americans Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow.” The regularly scheduled program, unprecedented in V.O.A.’s history, consisted of one-on-one interviews with African American scholars, poets, athletes, civil rights activists, businesspeople and others who discussed various aspects of the Black experience in the United States.

I need not discuss my achievements that have earned me promotion after promotion, but I have to share this experience that shows how exceptional the United States of America is.

In early April 1987, while on a seven-country tour to promote my V.O.A. programs in the African countries that used them, I arrived with my Beninese passport in Libreville, Gabon one Monday evening that was a holiday there. I came with a visa issued by the Gabonese embassy in Washington, D.C., but I was told on arrival that I needed a special visa that was required of reporters and lawyers. While white visitors who didn’t have entry visas were told to go to their hotels and come back the next day to get it, I was taken to a back room where other Africans were held. I was not beaten, but the immigration officer gave me a rough treatment. My plane tickets were stolen. I was exposed to mosquito bites in a hot, semi-dark back room, and called all kinds of names. (Early the next morning, the chief immigration officer apologized profusely and I had a great stay in Libreville.)

This is the beautiful side of the incident that shows the greatness of the United States. During my night-long detention, the U.S. Embassy’s public affairs officer, Tom Heart, and the Deputy Chief of Mission, DCM, second to the Ambassador—whose name I don’t recall—visited me twice to comfort me, a green card holder! The DCM told me something like it was too late for him to call President Omar Bongto to have me released.

There I was, an African being roughed up by other Africans in Africa and being literally rescued by Americans. Thirty-nine years later, Africans are being treated worse in South Africa, a country the whole continent supported during the tough apartheid years, and the South African authorities are doing nothing to stop it.

We rightly denounce Trump’s racism, but many of his xenophobic projects have been crushed by U.S. institutions, all the way to the Supreme Court which now has a super majority of conservative justices.

I doubt there are in Africa institutions strong enough to stop a bully like Trump. It’s no secret that in Africa, one head of state out of four has served for more than twenty years. The most common tool to achieve that feat is the removal of term limits. In addition to that, the dictators have a bagful of other tricks. Such leaders used to be the Zaire’s Mobutu Sese Seko type. But these days, they are easily Africa’s finest elites who have graduated from the best universities in the United States and Europe; some of whom have held important positions in world organizations.

Moreover, the sons who have succeeded their fathers who grabbed power for decades are walking in their fathers’ steps. Tired of being killed while protesting, the youths dare not take to the streets anymore.

Scaring enough, the new generation of populist, sweet-talking military leaders who vehemently criticize the old order don’t appear reassuring either. When a young West African military leader recently said with a straight face, “Forget about democracy,” which translates to, “I can do anything I want,” to me he gave his people and the world a reason to be scared. But he’s still being praised by some.

Today, July 4, 2026, 150 people from 50 global-spanning countries were sworn in as U.S. citizens, sort of against Trump’s will, at what used to be the residence of the first president of the United States, George Washington. Addressing the deeply moved new Americans, historian Douglas Bradburn said, “All the stories that are part of you, now become American stories,” adding, “When people ask me what are American people like, I now can talk about you, and your stories.” He also said, “The second side of that is that, now, all America’s stories, and our history, are your stories. The father of your country is George Washington.”

Where else on the planet do you hear such beautiful things? Happy 250th Birthday, U.S.A.!!