Does an external shock affect public opinion about adequate internal and external border restrictions in Europe? Yes and no, is the answer from Philipp Lutz and his co-author in the recently published article “External borders and internal freedoms: how the refugee crisis shaped the bordering preferences of European citizens”. The authors argue that the irregular inflow of immigrants, understood as a failure of external exclusion, could go hand in hand with citizens’ decreasing support for free movement within Europe. According to their rationale, the external threat posed by immigration might activate feelings of national identity and fuel scepticism about the EU’s ability to guarantee the integrity of internal freedoms. Drawing on Eurobarometer data between 2012 and 2018, their findings highlight that Europeans’ long-term support for free movement has been unaffected by the refugee crisis. In contrast, after the crisis citizens became more positive about internal migration and increasingly preferred border controls at the European, rather than at their national borders. Based on these findings Philipp Lutz and Felix Karstens conclude that political elites’ fears that failure to limit irregular border crossings undermines public support for free freedom of movement within Europe or the European model as a whole is unsubstantiated.