If Eileen Gu’s mother came to America for a better life, she certainly found it. Yan Gu, the daughter of two Chinese government officials, emigrated to the United States in the 1980s after immigration laws were loosened to dramatically increase arrivals from Asia and Latin America. She studied at Auburn University, Rockefeller University, and the Stanford Graduate School of Business, worked as a ski instructor, and even dipped into venture capital. In 2003, she gave birth to her daughter in San Francisco and raised her in one of the most privileged corners of the Bay Area.
What followed reads like a glossy brochure for elite America: skiing in Lake Tahoe at age three, a private girls’ school with tuition now topping $48,000 a year, a debutante presentation in Paris, Olympic training, modeling contracts, and enrollment at Stanford. It is the kind of story usually sold as proof of the “American dream.”
Then came the twist. In 2019, Eileen Gu announced she would compete for China in the 2022 Beijing Olympics. Since then, according to reporting cited in the article, she has received millions of dollars from the Chinese government and has become a valuable propaganda asset for America’s top adversary, the Chinese Communist Party.
“I am proud of my heritage, and equally proud of my American upbringings,” Gu wrote on Instagram. That line says everything. Her heritage—her loyalty—is Chinese. America was just an “upbringing,” a convenient launchpad that opened doors but did not inspire allegiance. Red, white, and blue as a résumé booster.
That same attitude appears in a viral TikTok from Montse Lewin, a self-described digital creator with family roots in Mexico. In a video with more than 91,000 views, she said people don’t move to America because it’s a better country, but because they want to make more money. She dismissed American culture and added that supporters of immigration enforcement should “rot in hell.” Subtle.
As blunt as it sounds, that mindset perfectly captures the counterfeit American dream sold for decades by the architects of mass immigration: America as an ATM, not a nation. In 2017, former Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez wrote that immigrants “put America first” simply by coming here for a better life. By that logic, Gu would be a model citizen—she maximized opportunity and cashed in globally.
But as writer Melissa Chen noted, Gu reflects the transactional worldview of neoliberal globalism, where allegiance is fluid and borders are just speed bumps on the road to profit. That’s why the corporate press treats her like royalty despite her loyalty to China. She embodies the America they promote: an economic zone, not a country.
If the American dream were only about wealth, Gu would be a hero. But if the dream is about self-government, civic duty, and loyalty to the nation that gave you everything, then her story reveals the flaw in birthright citizenship and modern immigration orthodoxy. Being born in San Francisco did not make her American in any meaningful sense—just as wanting higher wages does not turn economic migrants into patriots.
America has welcomed many who truly sought freedom and responsibility, including families like that of Alysa Liu, whose father fled the same country Gu chose to represent. The difference is allegiance. Wanting money doesn’t make you an American. Wanting to belong does.
Eileen Gu didn’t just choose another flag—she exposed the hollow idea that citizenship is automatic and loyalty optional. And that uncomfortable truth may finally force a serious conversation about what it really means to be American. In the end, that’s a step toward restoring a nation built on commitment, not convenience—and that’s a future worth fighting for.
