Tom gjelten immigration news

In the half century after the 1965 Immigration Act, the United States underwent a profound demographic shift, with newcomers arriving from around the world in numbers not seen since the early years of the twentieth century.

When the law was passed, fewer than five percent of Americans were foreign born.  Fifty years later, immigrants made up nearly 14 percent of the U.S. population, and the composition of the foreign born population had changed dramatically. The 1965 Act abolished the national origin quotas that favored immigrants from Europe and discriminated against all others. The United States for the first time became a country that officially welcomed people of all nationalities.

Over the next decades, America’s founding myth of openness was put to the test. Prior to the 1965, three out of four immigrants came from Europe, and the country’s cultural character reflected its Anglo Saxon roots. Since then, nine of ten have come from other parts of the world. One of the last—and most important– acts of the civil-rights era, the 1965 immigration Act forced a new consideration of the U.S. national identity. By committing to a multicultural heritage, America took a thrilling gamble, betting heavily on its own resilience.

Praise

“The 21st century will be defined by seismic global immigration, remapping human interaction to the core, and the United States will remain the model for other nations to emulate. Tom Gjelten understands why, not only because he is a byproduct of immigration, but because he has been in the trenches—the inner cities, the rural landscapes, the contested borders‑‑where America is reborn on a daily basis. In this probing exploration, he explains, lucidly and with compassion, the extent to which the motto e pluribus unum is the engine of progress.”
— Ilan Stavans, editor of Becoming Americans: Immigrants Tell Their Stories from Jamestown to Today

“Tom Gjelten sings of a new America that b

American identity and changing attitudes toward immigration have long been part of our history. NPR reporter Tom Gjelten wrote a book about this titled "A Nation of Nations: A Great American Immigration Story.” He wrote the book to mark the 50th anniversary of the 1965 immigration law.

That law, the recently retired NPR correspondent says, is responsible for changing the character and identity of the United States and forced us to define what American exceptionalism really means.

He was invited to give a talk at the College of St. Scholastica in Duluth, Minn. It was the kickoff event for the Alworth Center for Peace and Justice Lecture Series. The event was held virtually on Sept. 30, 2020.

Gjelten is the author of several other books including “Sarajevo Daily: A City and Its Newspaper Under Siege” and “Bacardi and the Long Fight for Cuba: The Biography of a Cause.”

He was a reporter for NPR for more than three decades and covered wars in Central America, the Middle East and the former Yugoslavia, as well as major national stories in the U.S. His most recent beat focused on religion in America.

TOM GJELTEN is a veteran correspondent for NPR News, currently covering issues of religion, faith, and belief. His beat encompasses such areas as the changing religious landscape in America, the formation of personal identity, the role of religion in politics, and social and cultural conflict arising from religious differences. His reporting draws on his many years covering national and international news from posts in Washington and around the world.

In 1986, Gjelten became one of NPR's pioneer foreign correspondents, posted first in Latin America and then in Central Europe. In the years that followed, he covered the wars in Central America, social and political strife in South America, the first Gulf War, the wars in the former Yugoslavia, and the transitions to democracy in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union.

After returning from his overseas assignments, Gjelten covered U.S. diplomacy and military affairs, first from the State Department and then from the Pentagon. He was reporting live from the Pentagon at the moment it was hit on September 11, 2001, and he was NPR's lead Pentagon reporter during the early war in Afghanistan and the invasion of Iraq. He has also reported extensively from Cuba in recent years.

Gjelten's latest book is A Nation of Nations: A Great American Immigration Story, published in 2015 (Simon & Schuster). The book recounts the impact on America of the 1965 Immigration Act, which officially opened the country's doors to immigrants of color.

His reporting from Sarajevo from 1992 to 1994 was the basis for his first book Sarajevo Daily: A City and Its Newspaper Under Siege (HarperCollins), praised by the New York Times as "a chilling portrayal of a city's slow murder." He is also the author of Professionalism in War Reporting: A Correspondent's View (Carnegie Corporation) and a contributor to Crimes of War: What the Public Should Know (W. W. Norton). His 2008 book, Bacardi and the Lon

Tom discussed A Nation of Nations during an hourlong interview on the Diane Rehm Show on Tuesday, September 15.   Listen to the interview online or read the transcript>

Tom’s op-ed in the Washington Post: “The Unintended Consequences of a 50-year-old U.S. Immigration Bill”

Tom’s Atlantic Online column: “The Immigration Act That Inadvertently Changed America”

“Backstory” feature on A Nation of Nations on Washington Week webcast with Gwen Ifill

Tom’s npr.org feature story: “In 1965, A Conservative Tried To Keep America White. His Plan Backfired”

Tom’s profiles of immigrant families on npr.org: “Influx Of Non-European Immigrants Defines America Today”

“How the 1965 Immigration Act Changed America”  Simon & Schuster author interview

“The Great Immigration Debate” Simon & Schuster author interview