How do political crises affect the relationship between home states and emigrants? Given the Arab uprisings and antecedent politics, I examine how major political developments shape an emigrant-home state transnational exchange. Unstable home states have a dual motivation for diaspora enfranchisement; on one hand, they will seek the recognition and legitimation of their domestic political processes abroad – either by their emigrant communities, or indirectly as a means to influencing the relevant policies of their host states. On the other hand, troubled states may also enfranchise their emigrant communities as a form of monitoring and control. Crises expectedly produce political winners and losers, and this may induce losers to exit the state yet remain affiliated and tied to the political developments back home. I argue that democratic or autocratic resolutions to crisis and their consequent effects on political rights have different implications for state policies and practices towards emigrant communities. Specifically, I hypothesize that post-crisis democratic governments may be less motivated to extend political rights to emigrant communities compared with post-crisis autocratic governments. The latter may in fact be highly incentivized to create and reinforce ties with its emigrant community and to do so through extending political rights abroad at a time when it might be simultaneously curtailing political rights back home. Both crises and subsequent enfranchisement opportunities motivate “diasporic entrepreneurs” to mobilize members at the fault lines of home country politics. To test these arguments, I set to construct a paired comparison of Egypt and Tunisia that relies on elite interviews, legal texts, archival evidence, and survey data, and uses textual analysis and process tracing to explain Egyptian and Tunisian emigrant enfranchisement policies and subsequent diasporic reactions during the 2011-2014 political crisis episodes. I argue that both Egypt and Tunisia witness discursive bargaining over extraterritorial citizenship – specifically diasporic political rights – in the form of constitutional amendments, nationality and citizenship law modifications, judicial textual reinterpretations, and contested voting procedures and candidacy requirements. In this project, I aim to contribute to the literature on state-diaspora relations and its subsequent effects on emigrants’ political mobilization and participation in their host countries. I trace Egyptian and Tunisian emigration policy and diaspora formation in the past decades. I also articulate the institutionalization of home state ties with its citizens abroad. Overall, this project strives to account for the contentious politics of activating and deactivating diasporic communities during politically turbulent times.