This paper traces the unfolding struggle of citizens to discern an American identity across the last two presidential elections and the events of September 11, 2001. Drawing on an in-depth study of unaffiliated voters in 1996, I outline voters' longings for an integrative picture of the world that would allow them to locate themselves as Americans. Though both political parties moved toward the middle in 2000, the extraordinary division in the country underlined the failure of the parties to provide a national mission. At the millennium, as ethnic Americans moved into the majority, the political chaos of the split election evoked familiar projections about the political and social meanings of ethnicity. The politicization of the Supreme Court was evidence for a political struggle about American identity that was interrupted by the events of September 11. I will suggest that these background developments and the dynamic and ethnic significance of the attack on America provide an opportunity for Americans to discover a new and complex picture of their role in a multinational, multi-ethnic world.