Donald Trump has already cratered the stock market, alienated military allies, and torn up the Constitution, but he’s also burning down the tourism industry. International visitors vacationing in the United States bring in hundreds of billions of dollars each year, though with the advent of Trump, they’re staying away.
And, frankly, they have good reason to. There have already been several disturbing stories of people being dragged away at border control, thrown in a private detention center, and only being allowed to fly home weeks later. Now someone has shared their experience on Reddit, begging potential tourists to “please be careful”:
— Priyamvada Gopal © (@PriyamvadaGopal) April 20, 2025
— Priyamvada Gopal © (@PriyamvadaGopal) April 20, 2025I
In summary, two European teenage girls were backpacking together, having already enjoyed their time in New Zealand. They planned to fly to Honolulu, then on to California, and then back to Asia. But when they arrived in Honolulu, they were selected for “additional questions”, with the interrogation rapidly becoming more intense, particularly when the immigration officials learned that the two girls sometimes did “small freelance jobs online”.
Despite having return flights booked, the pair were accused of being in the country as illegal workers, handcuffed, dragged to a prison, subjected to a humiliating full strip search, and tossed into a cell. The next day, they were returned to the airport, put on a flight, and told not to come back to the U.S. without official authorization.
It’s horrific, but it could have been worse. After all, these two teen girls only spent a single night in a cell rather than a week. But brutally heavy-handed treatment like this is already causing scared travellers to avoid the United States, as if border security is having a bad day, or get even a whiff of suspicion, you can be in a cell faster than you can blink.
Responses advise tourists to simply take the first flight out of the country they offer in order to avoid being taken into custody, others pointing out that a complete blanket ban on any professional activity is going to kill off the conference industry, and still others nervously wondering how the 2026 World Cup and 2028 Los Angeles Olympics are going to go.
This is already having a major effect. In March alone, tourist visits were down 12% compared to previous years. Visits from Western Europe fell by 17% – with German and Spanish tourist numbers dipping by 28% and 25%. Canadians are also staying away, with road trips to the States down by 32%.
Given that many trips to the United States will have been booked long in advance, it’s likely that these numbers will continue to drop throughout 2025. This means trouble for tourism hotspots like California, Florida, and New York – as their tourist-focused destinations simply can’t sustain themselves on domestic visitors alone. Let’s face it, nobody wants to book a vacation if they know there’s a very real chance that they’ll be dragged into a filthy cell as soon as they touch down.
Published: Apr 21, 2025 04:35 am