Lately, I have been seriously contemplating a move to Africa. I haven’t selected the nation to consider my future home, but I have wondered if returning to my ancestral roots would be the “cherry on top.” I’d like to say that my desire to leave the US was borne solely from my need to reconnect to my pre-slavery African heritage, but Trump’s election in 2016 made me reevaluate my assumptions about America.

I have always been aware of the US's complicated past with people of color. America began...