As the results of the American presidential election rolled in on November 4, a young Sudanese couple sat up through the night in their small town south of Khartoum, eyes glued to the television as state tallies were declared, watching anxiously. They had a lot riding on the outcome.
A year earlier, Monzir Hashim had won the state department’s annual lottery to obtain a green card for the US only to learn that President Donald Trump, in his latest iteration of the “Muslim ban”, had barred Sudanese citizens from immigrating to the US.
The election seemed to offer a second chance, and when Trump was eventually declared to have lost the vote, Hashim and his wife, Alaa Jamal, hugged with joy and erupted in wedding-style ululations.