The teens claimed CBP targeted them because they hadn’t booked hotels for their entire stay in Hawaii.
“They found it suspicious that we hadn’t fully booked our accommodations for the entire five weeks in Hawaii,” Pohl said. “We wanted to travel spontaneously. Just like we had done in Thailand and New Zealand.”
https://www.usatoday.com/story/travel/news/2025/04/21/german-tourists-turned-away-us-border/83195396007/
Provided that that’s true, and I’m not saying it definitely is, that would be a valid reason to deny entry.
I think we’re pretty well past giving the gestapo the benefit of the doubt.
This really doesn’t seem like something the administration has a hand in.
When you travel internationally and land the first thing that happens is you fill out a slip go through immigration. The slip asks how long you are staying and where your are staying among other things.
Not accounting for your accommodations for the full duration of your trip will get you flagged for more questions. If the immigration officer things you are going to work during your stay they will deny you because it’s illegal on a tourist visa.
What the girls should have done was just say they were staying at the hotel for the whole time (although 5 weeks at a hotel is probably also a red flag)
What an amazing coincidence that since the change in administrations there have been multiple horror stories about CBP detaining tourists at the slightest suspicion they might do housework or some undetermined gig work during a 3 week stay. Trying to pretend this is just how it always worked is naive in the extreme.
On the one hand, I don’t doubt it’s gotten worse. On the other hand, I’ve always heard stories about US immigrations being unreasonable, entirely humourless, and possibly detaing you or sending you back for the smallest mistake or omission.
I’ve never once heard about German teenagers being strip searched because they had a bad answer about whether they would do any work during their vacation.
It always worked this way just wasn’t worthy news. Ever watched boarder patrol this kind of shit happened all the time. Helping your friend do house work is considered work when staying in another country.
Multiple horror stories is the weakest data set you can come up with.
How many tourists do you think come through the US in a single day? What percentage does “multiple” cases make up?
Yes, it is how its always worked that if you go through immigration and you get flagged for something suspicious you get detained for further questioning. Did you expect the immigration officer to let you through if you failed the initial set of questions like "where will you be staying for the duration of your trip? "
Let me throw this back at you for a sec. How exactly do you are the Trump administration organizing this? Did they suddenly hire a bunch of new immigration officers? Among the hiring and spending freeze and stupid Doge stuff, where did these new officers come from? Do the officers now have some detained quota they need to meet each day? Are all TSA secretly MAGA waiting for the chance to deny tourists?
Sometimes the simplest explanation is right in front of you. The girls were too truthful on their form and that for them flagged and detained. You need to account for where you will be while in the US ( or most countries honestly). Otherwise it is assumed you might do something like try to work and stay long term beyond your visa. When their answers didn’t add up they got sent home.
If you don’t believe this go ahead and try and travel to any country and tell them you don’t have a place to stay yet, don’t know when you will leave exactly, but you’ll just wing it. See if that flies.
You really are shockingly naive. Yes, CBP officers are assholes dispositionally eager to treat non-Americans harshly and changes in administration do change policy, both explicitly and implicitly. Like their comrades in ICE, they’ve been itching to “get tough” the whole time.
Do you seriously think German teenagers were regularly getting strip searched for muddled responses to whether they would do any work and it was just for some reason not reported on prior to a couple months ago?
The administration has set the tone of “Fuck with people as much as you want. Lie if you want to. There will be no consequences.”
I agree, but you can imagine that when you have young adults in a room for hours, you can guide them toward those answers as well. When I was younger, I would book tickets to travel and explore the world without any idea of what the next day would bring. You can see how discussions can lead to questions like, “So, in five weeks, will you work if you don’t have a hostel?” and the response being, “Oh yeah, why not?” I’m not suggesting that the young person didn’t plan for this, but considering they were coming from Thailand and New Zealand…
In case you missed that part.
I hear you. 👌
I’ve said “I might answer some emails” at the EU border before, and the agent just shook her head and was like “try again, business or pleasure?”
This particular rule has been loosely enforced in post COVID times and people just need to re learn how to cross borders.
I would bet it was for a WWOOFing or Workaway style thing where you do a few hours menial labor in exchange for room and board. Often attracts backpacker types. Typical advice is to lie to Customs (in any country) and just get a tourist visa, which is always a gamble at best.
That’s what I was thinking too. And afaik that’s just legal.