Border politics at our doorstep with Ieva Jusionyte

The U.S.-Mexico border is not just a line on a map—it's a living, breathing site of power, asymmetry, and human cost, argues Ieva Jusionyte, anthropologist and MacArthur Fellow. Her latest research exposes a troubling new phase in border politics: the mass expulsion of Mexican nationals—often high-level organized crime figures—into the U.S. not through formal extradition treaties, but via executive decisions that bypass legal safeguards. These expulsions, driven by U.S. political pressure under the Trump administration, create a justice system that serves American priorities—drug trafficking and money laundering—while leaving behind Mexico’s own violent crimes—homicides, kidnappings, disappearances—unprosecuted. Jusionyte reveals how this practice undermines both national sovereignty and the development of Mexico’s weak criminal justice system, turning justice into a geopolitical transaction. Yet she also finds unexpected resilience: communities across the U.S., once distant from border struggles, are now organizing mutual aid networks in response to rising ICE enforcement, proving that the border’s reach extends far beyond the desert. Her work challenges us to rethink borders not as fixed lines, but as dynamic arenas where power, law, and humanity collide. Jusionyte’s journey—from studying emergency responders who cross borders to follow guns, to now tracking the legal and moral fallout of expulsions—shows how one question leads to another. Her approach, rooted in deep ethnography and moral courage, refuses to accept borders as natural or neutral. Instead, she sees them as mirrors reflecting deep inequalities: in laws, in access to justice, in who gets to be seen as a person. As she puts it, 'You can't export justice.' The real question isn’t whether we should stop people from crossing borders—but whether we can build a world where justice doesn’t require crossing one.