pull up the drawbridge
verb1
To stop allowing people to join or enter; to follow a policy of isolationism.
- Near-synonym: pull up the ladder
- The impact of migration on the economy and on social provision is the key area of contest between those who support more or less unfettered movement of labour and those who want to pull up the drawbridge.2007, Toby Shelley, Exploited: Migrant Labour in the New Global Economy, page 121: