Teenage German tourists deported from Hawaii over ‘suspicious’ hotel booking
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TBF, that's normal. People tend to consume social media in their own language and don't get the full brunt of what's going on in the US. People want to stick to the idea that the world is just as normal as it was 10 years ago.
My experience is that travelling around the world is basically a full-time-job where you spend at least 2 hours every day gathering up-to-date info about your upcoming itinerary.
But maybe I'm weird that way. When I'm travelling with others, I usually slide into the role of travel guide automatically. -
TBF, that's normal. People tend to consume social media in their own language and don't get the full brunt of what's going on in the US. People want to stick to the idea that the world is just as normal as it was 10 years ago.
You'll still read enough about Trump and the US, even if you read in your native language. I see enough news about Trump every day, no matter what platform. The lady is just super naive and thought: nothing will happen?
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Travel to the USA is a risk sport like running in front of a bull in Pamplona streets
But the bulls will only either kill you or break a few bones if you don't get out of their way. Here, the "bulls" make sure to corner you and pummell you down, just for the thrill of it.
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Everyone who is going to USA for vacation is an idiot.
My friends are going there in June. They had booked the trip before Trump was even elected They have little kids and look as Aryan as it gets so they should be fine. But honestly in their place I would still seriously consider cancelling.
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My friends are going there in June. They had booked the trip before Trump was even elected They have little kids and look as Aryan as it gets so they should be fine. But honestly in their place I would still seriously consider cancelling.
I don't think that "looking as Aryan as it gets" will keep cutting it with the US. They are treating their own Citizens like this after all.
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Everyone who is going to USA for vacation is an idiot.
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Even if they admitted that "later", when exactly? After a night in the cold cell with a choice of being detained longer or immediate deportation if they admitted that?
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They did not send them to El Salvador btw, they're back in Germany now.
But the description of how they were treated is still harrowing:
Pohl and Lepère were interrogated in Honolulu International Airport for hours and allegedly subjected to body scans and strip searches before, finally, U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents denied them entry to the country and said they would be deported, according to the outlet.
Officials became suspicious of potential illegal work intentions after learning the teens had not booked accommodation for their entire five-week stay in Hawaii
So everytime I travel I'm a potential terrorist? That's what (many) backpackers do you dumbasses.
The women said they were placed in a holding cell beside some other detainees who were accused of serious crimes. The teens alleged they spent the night on moldy mattresses in a freezing double cell.
On March 19, the young travelers were allegedly taken back to Honolulu International Airport in handcuffs, where they requested to be sent to Tokyo, Japan.
Now imagine how much worse it is for all those so-called "illegals", and still how much worse when they get to El Salvador.
It's not entirely unwarranted, they WERE planning to work on a tourist-visa, which specifically and clearly not allowed in pretty much any country.
The horrible treatment is, of course, completely unwarranted, but denying entry isn't.
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‘We had already noticed a little bit of what was going on in the U.S. But at the time, we didn't think it was happening to Germans,’ Maria Lepère says
Maria Lepère is either a certified idiot or lives behind the moon and/or in TikTok.
I had a discussion a little while ago on Lemmy about someone saying “why should I care about US politics”. Well, add this to the reasons why.
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It's not entirely unwarranted, they WERE planning to work on a tourist-visa, which specifically and clearly not allowed in pretty much any country.
The horrible treatment is, of course, completely unwarranted, but denying entry isn't.
Yeah, with you on this. I know in the past these arrangements have been very lenient but the recent political developments just show this isn't the case anymore. It is very silly right now to admit you wanted to work on a tourist visa.
About having no bookings yet, that part was always sketchy. I went 15 years ago to the US for a 4 week trip and had only lined up the first hostel for a few days, the rest I had not planned yet, luckily got no questions but worried about it back then already.. Guess this is a thing of the past now.
The treatment however is definitely over the line.
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It seems like a bit of a stretch to frame two teenagers wishing to go island-hopping as part of their post-graduation world trip as "intending to work"
Deportation appears to be about as appropriate here as sending the SWAT team after someone who dropped a candy wrapper.
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It seems like a bit of a stretch to frame two teenagers wishing to go island-hopping as part of their post-graduation world trip as "intending to work"
Deportation appears to be about as appropriate here as sending the SWAT team after someone who dropped a candy wrapper.
It seems like themselves admitted that they intended to work?
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It seems like themselves admitted that they intended to work?
It seems like themselves admitted that they intended to work?
In what capacity?
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It seems like themselves admitted that they intended to work?
Work for their foreign clients with foreign companies. Remote work. While they were backpacking.
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Yeah, with you on this. I know in the past these arrangements have been very lenient but the recent political developments just show this isn't the case anymore. It is very silly right now to admit you wanted to work on a tourist visa.
About having no bookings yet, that part was always sketchy. I went 15 years ago to the US for a 4 week trip and had only lined up the first hostel for a few days, the rest I had not planned yet, luckily got no questions but worried about it back then already.. Guess this is a thing of the past now.
The treatment however is definitely over the line.
I've been stuck in customs for "not having enough money on me", despite credit cards and ATMs existing. It depends HUGELY on which individual you get in the US.
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It's not entirely unwarranted, they WERE planning to work on a tourist-visa, which specifically and clearly not allowed in pretty much any country.
The horrible treatment is, of course, completely unwarranted, but denying entry isn't.
It’s not entirely unwarranted, they WERE planning to work on a tourist-visa
[citation needed]
They said they wanted to travel spontaneously. That is, they had their first hotel booked, then would've booked another hotel, or left the states early.
Maybe Americans just don't understand travel that's not an organised five-day trip.
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Work for their foreign clients with foreign companies. Remote work. While they were backpacking.
Still Tax fraud and visa fraud. Works like this in most countries.
Not that I agree with these extreme measures. Most of Europe doesn't care but still: as ilegal in the US as it would be if an American tourist did the same in Germany.
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I don't think that "looking as Aryan as it gets" will keep cutting it with the US. They are treating their own Citizens like this after all.
Yes, but mostly PoC so far, from what I read.
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It's not entirely unwarranted, they WERE planning to work on a tourist-visa, which specifically and clearly not allowed in pretty much any country.
The horrible treatment is, of course, completely unwarranted, but denying entry isn't.
Where did you get that information? Because all it said in the article was:
Officials became suspicious of potential illegal work intentions after learning the teens had not booked accommodation for their entire five-week stay in Hawaii,
How not booking hotels for their entire trip equates to "potential work intentions" escapes me. If you were planning on working for five weeks, wouldn't you book a hotel near where you were planning to work? Was there a job lined up? Are we supposed to believe that in the middle of a round-the-world graduation trip, these girls wanted to spend 5 weeks working?
Alternate explanations:
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the "work" they were doing was shooting video of their adventures and posting it on YouTube in the hopes of establishing a career as travel influencers, so they can travel the world for a living. Basically, this trip was an investment in their future.
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border agents got pissed off and jealous of two rich girls traveling the world, and decided to fuck with them
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the girls became indignant at being treated like common illegal immigrants, and mouthed off, and agents decided to teach them a lesson.
Frankly, the real story is probably a combination of all three.
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Yeah, with you on this. I know in the past these arrangements have been very lenient but the recent political developments just show this isn't the case anymore. It is very silly right now to admit you wanted to work on a tourist visa.
About having no bookings yet, that part was always sketchy. I went 15 years ago to the US for a 4 week trip and had only lined up the first hostel for a few days, the rest I had not planned yet, luckily got no questions but worried about it back then already.. Guess this is a thing of the past now.
The treatment however is definitely over the line.
I used to teach a unique culinary technique, and had clients visit me from all around the world for training, including several Muslim countries. Only one client had a serious problem at the border, a young Muslim guy from India. His dad was a major Bollywood director, and was fairly wealthy.
He had gone to college in America, so he was using this trip to both visit me for a few days for his training, then going on to Miami to meet up with his American college friends.
His visa said he was here on a pleasure trip, but for some reason he was pulled aside for grilling. They demanded his phone, and looked through his texts, where they found messages between him and I, making arrangements for his training. That lit them up, and they started claiming he was coming here for work, not pleasure. He explained that he wasnt being paid, he was paying me, and it wasn't work. It was educational, if anything. It was really just an expensive experiential vacation adventure for a rich kid, like something I'd experienced before. Some clients really wanted to learn this technique to expand their culinary portfolio, while others just wanted to try it out for fun, and had the time and money to do it. If you came to America to learn to scuba dive, or surf, would it be considered work, or even educational?
The fact that he was here for education or work wasn't the point, the point was that the visa was for pleasure, so they were claiming it was a violation, even though most of the trip was with his friends (3 days with me, 2 weeks with his buddies).
Then they focused on his money. He was carrying about $2600, and they acted like that was an outrageous amount of cash for a rich young man to carry on an international trip. They demanded he tell them exactly how much cash was in his wallet, which they were holding, and had searched. He told them the exact amount, because he had counted his money on the plane, after they had landed. They told him he was lucky he knew the exact amount, or they would have kept his money and sent him home.
Eventually, they grudgingly allowed him to leave, and he got his training, and visited his friends, but he went home with a very negative view of the US government.
This all happened during the first MAGA administration.
