Is USA safe to visit?

[perellonuts]

I can’t even believe I’m asking this but is it safe to visit USA now? I’m concerned about the social media issue, I’m pretty sure I’ve liked one or two anti-trump posts each time I’ve doom scrolled since his first term. Could this be used against me? I definitely feel free speech is not tolerated there now. I’d be travelling with my neuro diverse son, age 7. He is perfectly capable with full autonomy and we travel a lot but being separated with no due process would be a disaster and scares the hell out of me. We’ve been invited to go to collect a prestigious award and they put you in a hotel for a few days etc. We have American friends and family and the first hand ICE stories are horrific.

This.

It's not "at the border". It's checked in advance. Hence the revocation of ESTA is a real possibility.

This is absolute insanity. Total social control and censorship of free speech. The biometrics alone will let them waltz through any face ID or fingerprint security, straight into all our most secure accounts, to access our private financial and medical data. Terrifying.

There is no valid security argument to any of this. If Americans want to be safe within their own borders, then they should get their rapacious imperialistic jackboots out of every country where they - or their proxies - currently occupy land, wage wars, control governments and corporations, or rape and pillage resources for their own profit. It really is that simple.

That is for the ESTA application which would be done before going to the airport and either approved or denied.

Or approved and then revoked just before you board (which is probably better than being revoked while you are in the US ....)

I'm sure no other Empires with worse human rights records would not move into the vacuum left by their withdrawal.
Be careful what you wish for.

And any planned trips unlikely to be covered by travel insurance if the ESTA is revoked in advance of travel

That's a different discussion. I was correcting a factual error.

Whether you've got to give all that info at the border itself or when applying to go there, the answer is still a no from me, and that would be the same for any country. It's a weird ask. As for all your family members addresses and things how can any of this be considered normal? and of course some people don't have that info what then. All very intrusive and odd and would put me off.

Surely if you've nothing to hide, you've nothing to fear ? Isn't that what we tell ourselves when we rack up the snoopiness in the UK ?

This tourist had a valid Visa waiver and was travelling with a US citizen according to the article: Article

More German nationals detained: Article

I'm aware you can rationalise it away and say 'wont happen to me- in better than these people'. And I said in my original comment that thousands of people are undoubtedly still visiting trouble free.But combined with the social media checking (will you be locked up for months for saying the wrong things about Trump?); the willingness to lock up children; and the reports of things like being denied medicine and locked in communal cells- it's just not worth the risk for me and my family, not for a holiday or a business trip. For starters, 100 days in detention would probably see me lose my job or be close to it on my return.

I've been to the US under every other President since Bush, but I just don't want to risk going there under this one.

We don’t know what criteria the new system may be looking for - wrong skin colour, too much/too little social media use, an employer with US conflicts/tariff issues, a family member’s details throwing up a question mark - who knows?

Who suggested guns weren't issue? Certainly not me. Nobody else as far as I can see.

My father had a friend who was shot by his own father because he thought he was a burglar. That was back in the late 50s. I know very, very well what the issues are with guns. They are rooted in the history and culture of the United States. But many, many Americans don't own a gun and don't use a gun. In 50 plus years of travelling in the US and living there twice I never came across any danger relating to guns anywhere. Its BS to say, as the person I was responding to said, or along these lines, that every other person is walking around with a loaded gun. It is not true. As you said yourself a lot of the shootings are related to criminality and gangs. To extrapoloate those stats across the country and population as a whole is 'laughable'.

I’ll be there next month and then again through end of July and whole of August. Might look for a trip later in the year too. Love the US.

I would never say I’m better than anyone but thanks for that assumption.

again, both cases you have listed here are very different! One is someone trying to cross the border at tijuana (I would never Ever in a million years cross at tijuana!!) and another is in relation to past offences.

i guess what im
asking is are there news stories of tourists with valid Estas being detained in airports? There are thousands of tourists into the us every day and if it was a major problem I would expect to hear news stories on a daily basis

I was last at US immigration at JFK in 2018. The family behind us strayed a little over the line you are supposed to stand behind. When they arrived there we were already at the desk whereas we had queued up behind others; they seem genuinely not to have spotted the line. The man taking our fingerprints was perfectly pleasant to us but shouted at them. Absolutely bawled at them. One of their DC looked terrified.

77 million per year - 220,000 per day

I meant that you believed you wouldn't make the same mistakes they made- and you clearly don't think you would as you've pointed out what they've done wrong. I'm sure you don't think you're a superior being in general.

As I said it's not worth it for me, or an increasing number of others. But plenty of people will still go, unless something really mad happens, like a family get detained en route to Disney World because of some tweets.

In around 2015 I made the mistake of putting the wrong hotel name on my form - eg I put Hilton Olympia as that was the one my work
always booked me into - completely forgetting they were now the Hyatt Olympia. It did not go down well 😬😬😬 and I’m a US citizen

Down by 13 million on 2024 and falling.

Well yes, I don’t feel superior but as an American I know not to go near Tijuana - too many horror stories. I also worked in the UK and other countries on work visas so I am very aware if you want to work in another country to be aware of the terms of your visa

Yes - I think my point was that 77 million tourists and so far no one has a story of anyone detained having obtained a valid esta…

So the MNetter who had one revoked before travel doesn't count ?

Well yes, because she wouldn’t have been able to travel. OPs question was about being detained in the airport - which i would assume she would have obtained a valid esta

“Every other person will be wandering around with a loaded gun” - I’m tired of people on this site exaggerating and fear-mongering about a serious issue. Does the US have gun violence? Yes. Are guns common in everyday life? No, unless you’re in a heavily crime-ridden area or an area of a state in which there’s a strong hunting culture.

If guns were as common in the US as some Mumsnetters seem to like to believe, we’d be hearing a lot more stories about armed civilians firing at mass shooters. Part of me almost wishes every other person was wandering around with a loaded gun. Then maybe somebody could have shot Robin Westman before he spent two whole minutes firing into Annunciation Catholic Church in Minneapolis. My kids go to other Catholic schools in the area and their schools’ sports teams play against Annunciation every year.