Almost the only thing I have is LinkedIn, which is always only as up to date as the last time I changed jobs, which I don't do often.
No Facebook, insta, snap, twitter, tiktok. I subscribe to maybe five channels on YouTube.
My HN account isn't linked to my main 'identity' email address so I could hide it just by having a clean phone (which I do for international travel anyway).
I feel like I'd be suspicious due to the lack of traceability. I've had work colleagues say that they couldn't find a trace of me online (although that was a while ago now, and not colleagues who are adept at online sleuthing).
My age may be just enough to be believably not terminally online.
Some people have to travel for work. For Canadians, lots of international flights connect through the US (especially if you're flying on the cheapest routes), and there's no way to transit through without "properly" entering the country. While the thing in the post doesn't yet apply to Canada (due to us not requiring an ESTA), it very well could become a thing soon. That would be pretty awful for everyone.
I’m on the same boat and told management at work that I won’t be traveling to the US while Trump is in power, which they seem to be fine with, but who knows if that’ll last.
> Those people wouldn't want to travel to a police state anyway.
I fall into this camp (little to no social media besides LinkedIn) and I've had no issues traveling to the EU or UK or really any other police state for that matter. Plan to do more this upcoming year.
Wouldn't an HN account need to be mentioned, once this platform is made visible enough, so that the bozos in charge, in the US, take it seriously? A social media ICE would love to dig into such.
Why not? Anything where user interaction is a primary portion of the site's content is social media. The term "social media" predates algorithmically-driven parasocial feeds, though it does postdate things like BBSes and PHPBB.
Then just say that. Customs has some list that's automatically generated based on a Google search or something like that, and all they're doing is trying to catch you lying. Like the TSA, this screening is done by the lowest common denominator of government employee to catch the lowest common denominator of terrorist or foreign subversive.
> to catch the lowest common denominator of terrorist or foreign subversive
My guess from the outside, is that none of these actions are actually meant to "capture" or even "detect" any of those things, the methods are likely to inefficient and small to be able to do so.
What they're trying to do, is make those people not even consider going to the US in the first place, because they're scared of getting caught. Same as a lot of the ICE actions and other things going on. They're not meant to be efficiently solving some concrete issue with their action, they're meant to scare the rest of the populace into being docile and accepting more and more control over time.
Same here, have had to cancel meetings, conferences, events and more because me and others don't feel like taking the risk of ending up in a detention center and sent to a foreign country. I'm guessing all of this is working exactly as they intended it to work.
Right on, who needs those puny half percents or the jobs related to them, when we have megacorps covering for the rest of the gdp (and exporting it to Cayman).
A lot of things will be harder for the US to do if everyone in the world hates us. Letting people come here and see that most Americans aren't monsters pays dividends beyond the dollars they spend.
The Trump Administrations actions read like a checklist of things you'd do if you wanted to destroy the US's power to protect itself and its allies and promote the well-being of its people.
> Letting people come here and see that most Americans aren't monsters pays dividends beyond the dollars they spend.
40% of the population still support Trump.
If you have 10 friends and ask them where they want to meet for dinner and 6 say let’s go to a Mexican restaurant and the other 4 say “let’s kill Bob and eat him”, you still need to be concerned about your friend group.
How could this be weaponised against someone you don't like?
How easy is it to set up a <any social network> account under someone else's name, post a bunch of inflammatory opinions, AI some photos of them at a Free Palestine rally, and then sit back and await the inevitable border crossing horror story?
Mental note: Research yourself (and your traveling companions) thoroughly before visiting the US.
No no, spend three months in an untraceable maze of ICE holding facilities, then to jail, then deported to a 'shithole' country that you didn't come from in the first place.
1: I'm guessing it's mostly in blue states?
2: I think there's a real desire to sort of go hard on eliminating globalization in all ways. "America is for Americans" and all that. I think the ideology trumps economics considerations.
My social media is full of rants about the ongoing trend of bringing fascism to the US and the authoritarian and repressive tendencies of the current president.
All the cases of people being turned away at the border over social media posts that I have seen reported were about illegal work. I am afraid even the CBP agents might not be bored enough to read some rando's political screeds. But it's impossible to tell for sure as your admission is solely the matter for the officer who would be handling your arrival.
What does this link have to do with what I wrote? There is not even the word "border" mentioned in the article. This article talks about canceled visas, not people denied entry at the border.
You think the same government that will kick people out of the country for saying something they don’t agree with will let people in the country for saying something they don’t agree with?
Canceling a visa does not kick anyone out of the country as far as I know.
And the article says their visas were revoked for celebrating death of Americans, it surely is "something they don't agree with" but your implication that it happens for anything they don't agree with is poorly thought through. Unless you really think celebrating someone's death is a regular thing normal people do, in that case you probably are a psychopath.
Yes I’m sure the same administration - the one that pardoned 1500 people who tried to kill the sitting VP - would have acted the same if it wasn’t a racist podcaster and instead someone of color.
Maybe they have done that out of pity? I mean, if you try to kill one senior citizen with 1499 of your buddies and still fail then how do you even keep yourself fed?
Considering that fascism is the de facto political ideology of the administration and the people who elected it, being against it would definitively be seen as "Anti-American" which seems to be something that is about to become illegal, and probably labeled as "terrorism" in the near future. See https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/09/coun...
Edit: Ah, and of course, I forgot the most obvious pointer; being against fascism in the US literally labels you as a "domestic terrorist" for some reason, although the US traditionally been against fascism up until this point. What, why and how people are accepting the whole "If you're against fascists, you're a terrorist" charade will probably forever be a mystery to me. https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/09/desi...
You are suppressing free speech of fascists by doing that. Your speech might make them feel bad and free speech is defined by your willingness to defend fascists.
As an enemy to free speech, you wont be allowed in.
>Besides, why would you want to come if you don’t like it here?
There's a difference between saying that you disagree with the way that a country is being run, and wanting to be violent or pursue criminal activity against that country or its people.
What you're missing is that the former should be legal in any democracy (and is in the UK), and the latter shouldn't be legal anywhere (and isn't in the UK).
You're claiming the UK lacks "freedom of speech" because it doesn't allow people to incite violence online, while saying the USA has free speech, despite it seemingly rejecting visitors for legal political speech.
'You're claiming the UK lacks "freedom of speech" because it doesn't allow people to incite violence online, while saying the USA has free speech, despite it seemingly rejecting visitors for legal political speech.'
Voicing support for the group Palestine Action has been met with quite harsh responses in the UK, even though that group is arguably non-violent in that its criminal actions are directed towards property with the aim of slowing actual violence.
There are other similar developments in UK state policy.
The accused person claims to have panicked due to how the police were interfering. If I understand the article correctly the cop was off work for three months due to the injury.
> You're claiming the UK lacks "freedom of speech" because it doesn't allow people to incite violence online, while saying the USA has free speech, despite it seemingly rejecting visitors for legal political speech.
Free speech means the country must tolerate what citizens say; it does not mean the country can't exercise its discretion over its borders to bar entry to foreigners who say things citizens don't like.
To the contrary, it's pro-democratic. In a healthy democracy, people should be able to vote to create the kind of society they want. That includes being able to exclude, through their government, outsiders who don't share their values.
Next up, in a society you should make sure that people you want to exclude have to drink from certain water fountains, can’t be in the same pool and go to separate schools…
Is it not chilling if government can proscribe the things that you say for other people, as if your position is one the government can directly oppose and call illegitimate?
I suspect those who find it chilling also perceive a weak distinction between citizens and visitors. For people who see that difference as foundational, differing treatment of those two groups is not chilling.
Rights can be inalienable but not universal. These rights are conferred by the government, but arise by virtue of membership in a body politic. For example, the right to vote isn’t universal but the government can’t take it away. Free speech arises out of America’s Anglo history and tradition and was viewed by the founders as a political right that protects democracy. There is nothing inconsistent about saying that this right is inalienable for citizens, but doesn’t extend to visitors who aren’t members of our body politic and aren’t entitled to participate in our democracy anyway.
The people you're describing found it consistent with liberty to own other humans, so forgive me if I am skeptical.
I understand your point, I just have a different theory of rights. Just because something is logically conistent doesn't mean I agree with the starting premises.
Personally, are any of your beliefs or statements things that could ban you for entry into the US? Because I have quite a few things that I have said on social media which would likely prevent my entry. It certainly doesn't make me feel like a "member of a body politic" when that body treats my beliefs as intrusive and foreign.
That's certainly a stance you can take, but it's not one I'd expect to see from a US administration that's repeatedly (including from the president less than 48 hours ago) got on its high horse to criticise what it perceives as a government crackdown on freedom of speech in European countries.
It's only hypocritical if you believe in universal values that apply to citizens and outsiders alike, which Trump's camp does not. There is nothing inconsistent with supporting free speech for Americans in America and British people in the U.K. while also supporting screening visitors to those countries based on their ideologies.
But even then you can see that they continually talk about the suppression of 'free speech' when the people talking are white supremicists and neo-Nazis. But I am not aware that there is a single instance of them sticking up for Islamic or other radicals that don't fit their agenda.
When the US criticizes Europe for free speech and political suppression, you can be sure they're complaining because the criminalization of literal Naziism harms Trump's allies.
> Besides, why would you want to come if you don’t like it here?
Family, work, others in the group who enjoy it, the level of enjoyment might still be above the level of frustration, wanting to help, emergencies, etc. I could think of many reasons one would want to go to a country even though you disagree with ~50% the population + current leaders.
I've been in North Korea as an example, but I'd never claim to support the ideas and politics of their leader(s).
Reductionism is the sign of a lack of nuance, I speak badly of the USA but still would like to attend a friend's wedding if they choose to have it there. It doesn't mean I don't have contempt for how the country is being run, or how its society is quite flawed, saying those things don't make me an enemy of the state nor do I hate and dislike every single person and thing from there.
This lack of nuance is exactly one of the major flaws of American society, it's either team red or blue, in-group or out-group, black-and-white thinking is rather childish...
Sure, be one-sided if that's how you want to live you life. The rest of us will continue with nuance, and talk to people we disagree about, and favor freedom of expression above conformity. But again, you do you, I'm not asking you to change your opinion, just understand that many value other values.
> A vast majority of people aren’t happy about what’s going on.
What makes you say that? Granted, I'm just an outside observer trying to see what's going on, but since the majority isn't protesting as far as I can tell, it doesn't seem like the majority doesn't care too much currently. Probably most people are in a dire enough situation that they cannot afford to protest, and are busy enough trying to figure out how to re-organize their living situation.
> Probably most people are in a dire enough situation that they cannot afford to protest, and are busy enough trying to figure out how to re-organize their living situation.
What is your mental model of the median American citizen?
> The nation’s affordability crisis has not spared middle-class families, one-third of which struggle to afford basic necessities such as food, housing, and child care.
> Across the 160 U.S. metro areas studied, at least 20% of middle-class earners cannot afford to live in that place, after adjusting for local income ranges and price variations.
When you don't know how to afford food for the week or pay the next rent, you're hardly interested in going out on the street and protest. Been there and done that, and politics, no matter how aggressive or "against you" it can feel, is really the last thing on your mind in those situations.
> Boiled down and greatly simplified; someone who struggles to afford food, housing, and child care.
This is not a good description of the median American. Your article is about the income required to afford a "comfortable life," which is a vague target. You can get a concrete idea of what this target seems to mean by looking at the calculator they use: https://www.epi.org/resources/budget/.
For a 2 adult/2 child household in the Baltimore metro area, the calculator estimates you need a household income of $126,000 to meet this "comfortable life" benchmark. For a single person with no kids, the standard is $54,000 a year. It does not make sense to say that someone making $50,000 a year or a family making $100,000 a year in Baltimore (which is a cheap area) is "struggling." My sister-in-law's friend, a 20-something who works as a nanny, probably makes less than that and she has time and money to go out, travel, etc.
The basic error in this analysis is that it bakes in a number of assumptions about standard of living. It assumes that people with significantly below-median incomes (it defines middle class as the middle 60%, so someone at the 25th percentile is counted as middle class) can live alone in a median house, etc., send their kids to corporate daycares, etc. But people with below-median incomes live in below-median houses, they have roommates, they rely on family for childcare, etc. My sister-in-law's friend has roommates, which frees up a lot of money to go do stuff.
If you applied this standard to Europe, you would probably conclude that people are quite desperate there, though of course they are not. In Spain and Italy, half of adults 25-34 live with their parents. They probably couldn't afford to live by themselves in a median-priced apartment. But does that mean they're struggling and would have no time to protest?
So they aren't happy with what's going on, no? They just don't have the means to do anything meaningful about it until the next election cycle. Hopefully the one thing this administration has done is decreased voter apathy.
> Probably most people are in a dire enough situation that they cannot afford to protest, and are busy enough trying to figure out how to re-organize their living situation.
A lot of it's that. Our GDP is inflated by bullshit like over-paying for healthcare to the tune of double-digit percentages of total GDP, among other things, so we're flat-out not as rich as we look on paper, as a country. Our social safety net is really bad, government retirement systems and disability are sub-par by OECD standards, and we may have as few as zero paid vacation days or ability to refuse a shift (without being fired for it).
Anyone under the top 20% or so in the US is struggling, or at least stressed out by knowing that one bad month can mess them up for years and years and ruin any long-term plans they had.
We're also a lot more spread out than most countries. It's a lot more expensive and time-consuming to go protest in DC when you live in, say, Colorado, than it is for someone in Marseilles to go attend a protest in Paris. So they go to some local protest with 50 people instead, or maybe to one in Denver with a couple thousand, and you never hear about it. And the protests don't get rowdy (they might get teargassed anyway, of course) because see above about the "one bad month" thing—an arrest without charges of a working adult can easily end up making their family homeless, because they lose their job and can't get another one fast enough (and it's much, much worse if even very low-level charges are filed, even if the charges don't stick or are dropped—our legal system is great at eating thousands of dollars for what ends up being nothing, besides further schedule disruption bringing further risk to employment)
> A vast majority of people aren’t happy about what’s going on.
Because Trump hasn't gotten prices to pre-Biden levels like he promised, not because of what he's doing at the border. Trump has a 49% approval rating on immigration, 50% on "returning America to its values," and 51% on "fighting crime in America's cities." https://harvardharrispoll.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/HHP... (page 9).
51% of the country, including 32% of democrats, support "us[ing] the National Guard and active-duty military to police American cities and stop crime and disorder." (Page 23)
I genuinely don’t. The French are famously xenophobic. Even Americans who are xenophobic in principle are not so in practice (which is why the so-called American “far right” is full of immigrants, and why anti-immigration Trump won a narrow majority of naturalized citizens in 2024). Meanwhile, the French are not xenophobic in principle but are very much so in practice.
Yeah, turns out the government taking a strong-arm approach to managing private industry and enforcing cultural cohesion is not necessarily a bad thing.
Half things people criticize the current administration for enforcing wouldn't fly in China either (and more), but the real and final blackpill is we really should be copying them in more ways than one.
And we don't even have things like hidden police officers stalking influencers that conveniently drop by to check on them when they show something problematic on stream. (See: Hasan's recent trip to China, where officers surrounded him to check his phone within 30 seconds of him showing a Xi Jinping meme to his stream)
Everything that a certain population of the US correlated with the color Blue dislikes is considered hate speech by them, so things become impractical. Thankfully there are fewer and fewer snowflakes.
The trump administration is labeling people against fascism as domestic terrorists. Please don’t make this website Reddit with your idiotic views about ‘snowflakes’
I mean, a quick search of all of these people, and you can find something which absolutely warranted police investigation. That's the police doing what they're meant to do — investigate and ensure public safety.
- Jon Richelieu-Booth was investigated for stalking and making threats. The gun photo was not part of the police investigation.
- Jordan Parlour was charged for suggesting attacking hotels housing asylum seekers.
- Bernadette Spofforth was investigated for distributing misinformation with the intent to incite violence.
- Lucy Connolly for exactly what you say, inciting violence
- Norbert Gyurcsik had and was selling terrorist materials. (Just because you pair something illegal in a melody doesn't change its content...)
(With the exception of Maxie Allen and Rosalind Levine, which was an unlawful arrest and they were had restitution for it.)
> - Jon Richelieu-Booth for posting a picture of himself with a gun in the US
A quick search suggests that the photo with the gun wasn't the sole cause of the arrest, given there were stalking allegations "involving serious alarm or distress" from someone he had a conflict with, where the gun was one part of what caused the complainint to (claim to) feel threatened. Police may well have overreacted due to the gun post, but your framing leaves out rather relevant details.
> - Jordan Parlour for Facebook posts that were deemed ‘hateful.’
Appears to have incited violence by advocating an attack on a hotel, something he pleaded guilty to.
> - Bernadette Spofforth for a post with a “mild inaccuracy”
Was arrested for posting a fake name for an attacker, but released and faced no further action.
Calling potentially putting a target on the back of someone innocent by connecting them to a violent crime a "mild inaccuracy" is at best wildly misleading.
> Maxie Allen and Rosalind Levine
These people did get a wrongful arrest payout, but the claim was most certainly not just raising concerns in a private parent's WhatsApp group. The claims including harassment, and causing a nuisance on the school premises. The claim was still wrong, and the payout reflects that the police should not have been so quick to believe the allegations before making an arrest. But your claim is still hyperbole.
> - Lucy Connolly, for a post calling for mass deportation and to set fire to hotels housing immigrants
At least in this one you admitted the arrest was over incitement to violence.
> - Norbert Gyurcsik, for having “extreme right wing music”
No, for buying and distributing albums whose lyrics breach terrorism legislation and intended to incite racial hatred.
I have plenty of issues with UK terror legislation, which I believe is being abused to shut down legitimate speech at times, but framing this the way you did is again wildly misleading and hyperbolic.
But even if none of your claims were wildly misleading, none of them support your initial claim:
> You are allowed to say it. Unlike UK, you won’t be arrested. But you won’t be allowed in.
... about a comment referring to criticism of the government.
None of the cases above were relevant to that. Most of them are relating to classes of speech that are not protected in the US either.
This is hysterical. What actions is it you imagine the UK government would have taken to disadvantage me in secret because of what I've said about them that have been so inconsequential that I haven't noticed them?
There's no right to entry at US borders; you can be arbitrarily refused (or much worse) for any subjective suspicion.
(And you are misled by assumptions of privilege, any readers who think this could never happen to you. Your social non-conformity (rejection of social media) is quirky and geeky and completely harmless; and surely the nice government man will understand this).
Tying this into the Paul Krugman post about social media tech giants running the US [1], perhaps it's the US running the tech giants for mass surveilance? Especially of foreigners, of course.
Governments around the world criticise social media and tech giants but they still work with them because they want the concentration of power to enable surveillance.
Of course. And it's not just surveillance, it's censorship and narrative shaping -- doing a convenient end-run around the first amendment's prohibition on government infringing speech.
It's the other way around, the US wants Israel as an asset and is currently fighting to keep it one despite having been implicated in the accelerated genocide in Palestine, crime of aggression and so on. This is an extremely unpopular policy, and will only become more so over time as current young generations mature with the trauma of having spent years constantly exposed to graphic material from rather heinous atrocities and proud celebrations from the perpetrators. One of the few solutions to this problem that relevant US elites consider viable is to extend control over mass and social media, recently and infamously voiced by Hillary Clinton who says it outright at staged events.
In this context it is important to keep in mind that the bulk of members of the zionist movement are christians from modern denominations. The unnamed "they" you mention are these people, and not to be conflated with the israeli jews or jewish zionists in general, who are a minority influence in the movement.
I'm also fairly certain that the shaky old people chasing this control over communications actually believe that younger generations are more or less brainwashed by what they presumably see on screens, which is likely to be quite the psychological projection.
"Officers were instructed to screen for those "who advocate for, aid, or support designated foreign terrorists and other threats to national security; or who perpetrate unlawful anti-Semitic harassment or violence"."
Okay, that's your job then. It's not mine or anyone else's job to just hand everything over.
That's like saying aircraft inspections is the FAA's job and it's not Boeing's job "to just hand everything over." Entering into a country's borders is a privilege and you submit to an inspection in doing so. One of the very first things the American founding fathers did in 1789 was to create a customs service to perform border inspections: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Customs_Service.
Interesting that threats to national security and "antisemitism" are put on an equal footing and clearly above everything else; also makes me wonder what is "unlawful antisemitic harassment"- the US considers every speech lawful as far as I understand. Or, if some speech is indeed unlawful, is it going to matter only if that speech is against Jews or Israel?
It's fair to be very loud (and even very disruptive, although that hardly applies to this case) when protesting against a genocide. That's what democracy is for, sorry that it hurts the feelings of the supporters of a country whose prime minister is wanted for crimes against humanity.
Sure but they'll make your day extremely unpleasant before deporting you or if a USC letting you in.
A few things that's happened to me as a citizen after invoking right to remain silent to CBP
1) Told I could not enter the country. Held up for 3-24 hours in holding areas. Officials come in and claim they will revoke my passport under "national security"-esque grounds. Lots of bluffing and huffing and puffing. Diesel therapy of being made to go back and forth to interrogating officers and then constantly prodded to be deprived of sleep. After a few shift rotations no one is left that know why you were being fucked with so you then [hopefully] get let go.
2) Dogs constantly come in, none of them alert. Eventually they get tired of finding nothing and write up a fraudulent affadavit for a warrant claiming one alerted anyway. Strip searched, hands cuffed and feet chained, imprisoned in a holding cell with people you can't speak the language of, diesel therapy again in prisoner van driven all over the state. Taken to two different private hospitals where CBP officers claim there is drugs up my ass. Cursed and touched without consent by private hospital staff (oh you can complain to the board as I did, lol, the state board just claims since CBP told them to their license isn't in jeopardy). Hospital staff rack up bills, which are sent to me privately and go to collections. Medical records state nothing was found but they "Think I'm packing drugs" anyway despite absolutely no medical evidence.
What do you expect from them? Unless saxenaabhi is code for "US CBP Commissioner" or some position of an equivalent power, there is very little that an HN user can do about it at this point.
I'm not an American, but I'm doubtful there's 100 millions Americans out there who think this is wrong, let alone to an extent where they would be willing to do anything about it. If you look at it in terms of scenarios that can actually happen, the US has already decided about a year ago - now they and the rest of the world are along for the ride. Something truly momentous would have to happen now for an agency as powerful as the CBP to change course, barring an unlikely sudden mood change from up top.
> A few things that's happened to me as a citizen after invoking right to remain silent to CBP
What happened that caused you to “invoke your right to remain silent”? When you enter a country, including the US, you are asked some pretty standard questions that would be weird to refuse to answer.
I answered the questions on what I had to declare and anything regarding my identity and citizenship, along with presenting my passport. I also will answer the question to which countries I've been to, although I know of no requirement to do so. I will answer the question about whether I have currency and instruments exceeding $10,000. Other than that I will not answer, nor am I aware of any requirement to do so.
This caused me to be fucked with mercilessly for about 10 years. Eventually I was investigated by an HSI officer who seems to have determined I'm just a crazy libertarian or something, now I tend not to get held up terribly long.
Edit:
I have tried to answer below questions but it appears I cannot post any more messages until a certain times elapses. Below commenter has repeatedly shifted his attack, it is clear only goal is to shift and attack my message through a series of moving questions that keep moving the goalposts. 'This' did not happen 10 years ago, some of the events happened 10 years ago, some of them significantly more recent, and I have pretty much fully defined what sort of questions were answered. But of course it's pointless to even reply such commenters as I know from experience they are only going to dig endlessly until a magic 'gotcha' is found as to why I deserve it.
Yeah, it was confusing. I my circles the US one is known as "BP" and Canadian is "CBP". It makes more sense that they were talking about the Mexican border in retrospect given some other cues.
You must be misremembering, or maybe the your social circle mixed up the two by accident, which then became established. The Canadian border agency is never called CBP, because the actual name of the agency is CBSA. CBP always refers to the US agency.
Yes, but few other countries are as draconian about this as the US seems to want to be, and it is relevant to want to discuss how it will affect the US to make itself a less attractive place to travel to.
Do you have an actual point that doesn't involve me divulging private information of people who are not part of this conversation? My identity is on my profile; identifying the people in question would be rather easy.
If what you're suggesting is that the US is not being more draconian than most, you're free to make an actual claim about how.
I'll note that this article is about people eligible for the visa waiver program, which does not include any African countries - travelling to the US from African countries is also far more draconian than what is outlined in the article, so it's unclear why you think the comparison is relevant.
For one: the US is way more permissive than the EU when it comes to visa duration.
Common to get a 10 year US visa. Schengen visa? For the duration of your visit (for which you have to have bought plane tickets and accommodation before showing up for a visa appointment). The EU also charges pretty hefty fees for a Schengen visa, which I view as a racket and/or xenophobia.
Don’t even get me started on the requirement to hand over your passport at hotels in Europe!
My point is that characterizing the US as “more draconian than most” is quite far from reality, which is a lot more nuanced.
> Common to get a 10 year US visa. Schengen visa? For the duration of your visit
Both of these are possible. Neither are nearly that simple.
For starters the validity period depends on the country, and the type of visa, and since you mentioned Africa, applicants from the vast majority of African states are limited to single entry visas with 3 months validity for B-visas. A few can get 4-5 years, and a handful (I think Morocco, Botswana, South Africa) can get 10 years.
Given that, it's rather odd that you used specifically African countries as the basis for comparison and then pulled out 10 year duration.
On the other side, it is reasonably uncommon to be limited to just the stay for Schengen visas, though it can certainly happen, especially for applicants from poorer countries. And validity can be up to 5 years. But you certainly can
> The EU also charges pretty hefty fees for a Schengen visa, which I view as a racket and/or xenophobia.
The standard cost for a Schengen visa is 90 euros or 105 USD. If you've paid more that has been service fees to application centres, not the EU fees.
The application fee for a US B-visa is 185 USD, in addition there is an issuance fee for some countries, most of them African.
What is classed as a social media? I expect they'd want to view by personal instagram, but what about my old business Xitter account that I can't even get into because something went wonky with the 2fa? What about my github? My HN account? Do they want to see my discord history? How will they find my accounts anyway? Not all of them are under the same account name, real name or email address
The answer to all of those is "yes" and they will not bother to find them, they will ask you to list them. Omitting information or providing false information on your visa application is a felony.
It's the same logic as behind the "Are you a terrorist?" question. Lying is itself a crime, and can be used to prosecute you in the future.
I think the point to many of those questions/requirements are to ensure absolutely everyone can be prosecuted or deported because it's basically impossible to complete the immigration process or just about any other complicated government process without doing something that could possibly be construed in the most uncharitable way as being answered incorrectly.
"You failed to tell us that you made a single post on an obscure forum 4.5 years ago that questioned if capitalism was truly a good system, have fun being deported to a random country, you communist"
I've quoted Marx on HN on more than one occasion. I'm not sure they'd like my social media profile, despite having also been consistent in arguing for liberal freedoms that the US used to like to claim to favour.
I've visited the US many times, but I have no intention of going back under the current regime.
I transited through China earlier this year, and I frankly felt less concerned doing that - despite having criticised the Chinese government online many times over the years - than I would feel about entering the US at this point.
Funny that people are mostly discussing the details of what social media would be scanned. My question is more: why would I ever want to enter US again?
What happens if you declare that you don't have any social media accounts?
There are already forms that ask for social media info, e.g. student visa applications. Surely some of the applicants just don't have any social media profiles. Maybe some of them are reading this. I'm curious about their experiences.
Then they'll do a quick lookup to confirm if you actually don't have any accounts, and if they find any, they'll reject you because you lied. US agencies already are keeping track of what individuals have what online accounts, so they're asking to confirm, not to learn.
If you truly don't have social media, their search won't show any hits, and there isn't much you can do about it. Just make sure you're actually answering the question truthfully.
Literally all data coming in/out of the US (lots of it, even between other countries sometimes routes in-between US network transit points) is kept, and considering the possibilities that just private companies have today by dealing with data brokers and others offering "social media protection" (or whatever they call it today), it's hard to even imagine what the government and its agencies can do.
Did we really forgot about what happened back in 2013 so quickly? Did people assume all these agencies suddenly stopped doing what they've been doing for decades? Nothing you do on the internet with regular network connections are hidden to these entities, don't live falsely under the impression that you can.
It's not even about like or dislike. Some people dislike the UK, but I imagine that few feel threatened by the prospect of having to cross its border. It's an easier sell to make someone come to the country despite whatever they don't like to attend a big event. But with the US, who knows at this point? The system had been shaken up so much in the last year that there's no telling what's going to happen to any given entrant (especially someone from one of the "disfavored" countries), or what the rules are going to be like tomorrow. It's not preference, it's preference combined with fear.
FIFA's comical attempt to bribe him with a bauble might be a lot about them trying to persuade him not to do this, among other things that will mean nobody will want to attend games.
Considering the amount of people who always go to the World Cup yet is skipping the US-specific events of 2026, I'm not sure it'll be so interesting after all. Will more or less be like how Las Vegas seems to be today, a former shadow of itself.
Precisely speaking, they're looking to catch any critique of Israel because it'll provide a broad dragnet that will exclude a lot of Muslims and libs.
(I'm not just saying this to be inflammatory. We already know the administration has been going after legal immigrants on the basis of criticisms of Israel. This is a completely reasonable connection to this social media policy.)
Israel, or the US and its current admin? While it's pretty obvious that these two countries have ties like no others, it would seem weird if they were looking for criticism of a foreign state first rather than their own, despite the circumstances.
Going after "anti-semitism" gives the admin the political top-cover to systematically abridge various Constitutional rights and anyone who pushes back is "obviously" an anti-semite.
And why would they exclude muslim and liberal tourists?
The reason they are creating all sort of censorship and unconstitutional rules to prevent criticism of Israel is, surprise!, to benefit Israel. It's otherwise incredible how Israel happens to be always the lucky recipient of all sorts of benefits and favours that are all intended for some other purpose. Come on.
> And why would they exclude muslim and liberal tourists?
What? Because MAGA hates Muslims and libs, that's why. What's confusing about that?
Yes a lot of the policies are designed to benefit Israel, however that's completely distinct from being designed to benefit Jews. The administration doesn't care about ant-semitism on its own merits, but it does care about protecting Israel.
Do some reading on the theological love affair between American evangelicals and Israel to understand the distinction more clearly. The short version is that evangelicals need Israel to be controlled by Jews in order for their end-world prophecies to come true. Said prophecy includes all the Jews being left here on earth post-rapture to face 7 years of horror.
Yes, people do literally believe this and yes, it is a significant force in American politics.
> evangelicals need Israel to be controlled by Jews in order for their end-world prophecies to come true
No, evangelicals need all the Jews to go back to Israel for their end of the world prophecy to come true. So why don't they just pass laws to expel them from the US? It would be criminal of course, but coherent with their goals. The fact is, coherence stops when it stops benefitting zionists. They are nutters but their folly is well directed.
Also, as I just said in my previous comment, you're claiming that Israel is getting some specially favourable treatment by sheer chance. Nothing to do with the people who live there or that consider that their own promised land. Come on.
Finally, why you feel the need to specify that Jews and zionists are not the same. Nobody has mentioned Jews so far (unless for the frankly naive idea that this preoccupation with "antisemitism" is actually about Jews- the most accomplished, safe and protected group in the US- rather than about Israel).
> No, evangelicals need all the Jews to go back to Israel for their end of the world prophecy to come true
Not according to literally any evangelical I've ever spoken to, nor any mainstream evangelical in US theo-politics. Nor is that actually stated in scripture. The complete assemblage of Jews in Israel can happen during or after Tribulation via Jesus teleportation magic.
Sovereignty to rebuild the temple is all that's required for Jesus to gain his Jew-teleportation powers.
Based on your vernacular I'm going to guess you aren't from the US and have no clue what the US religious landscape is actually like.
> you're claiming that Israel is getting some specially favourable treatment by sheer chance
I made no such claim.
My claim is that they're getting "favorable" treatment as a purely instrumental means to an end. In this case (the visas) the end is to exclude Muslims and libs. In other cases it's to bring back kamikaze Jesus. None of it has to do with actually liking Jews.
> Finally, why you feel the need to specify that Jews and zionists are not the same.
Because otherwise a person literally can't parse the factual statement that American evangelicals love Israel but don't care for Jews?
> Sovereignty to rebuild the temple is all that's required for Jesus to gain his Jew-teleportation powers.
They already have sovereignty, so why don't evangelicals lobby to withhold all aid to Israel unless they get to work and rebuild the temple?
> I made no such claim. My claim is that they're getting "favorable" treatment as a purely instrumental means to an end.
That's exactly the claim I was talking about. You strive to justify every favorable treatment Israel gets as the fortuitous side-effect of something that has nothing to do with those who actually materially benefit from it- that is, those who live in Israel or consider the promised land of their own people. Isn't that a bit suspicious to you?
> Because otherwise a person literally can't parse the factual statement that American evangelicals love Israel but don't care for Jews?
I understand this, but can't help thinking that this alliance with religious fanatics is too lucky to be random. I mean "they want absolutely nothing from me except giving me money and protecting me politically and militarily? That is great, how do I get more of these? Who can I finance and boost to spread this religion even more?"
> They already have sovereignty, so why don't evangelicals lobby to withhold all aid to Israel unless they get to work and rebuild the temple?
Sure: Because rebuilding the temple would trigger a regional war and evangelicals want Israel to win that war, ergo cannot withhold aid.
More generally, because despite people actually believing these things, they find it much harder to put into real logical action. Same reason people who believe the end times are fast-approaching for some reason aren't selling all their belongings and knocking off their bucket list.
> Isn't that a bit suspicious to you?
No not really. My theory explains both the rampant anti-semitism throughout the GOP and the extreme pro-Israel sentiment within the GOP. Your theory fails to explain half of it.
Not sure how to parse your last paragraph. Who said it's random? It's not random at all: there's a clear lineage between evangelical and Jewish belief systems. It's super not-random! Their prophesies are intertwined because they're derived from the same sources.
> Because rebuilding the temple would trigger a regional war
Ah because there isn't already one, and Israel is not the only one armed with nuclear weapons and its unwavering ally is not the dominant world superpower?
> despite people actually believing these things, they find it much harder to put into real logical action
Yet they don't find it hard at all as long as it aligns with Israeli interests.
> My theory explains both the rampant anti-semitism throughout the GOP
This part I miss. Where is the rampant antisemitism in the GOP? Last time I checked, the prime minister of Israel is always welcomed in the US (especially by the GOP) as a demigod. All advisors and mediators for Israel Palestine and the middle east are Jewish. Antisemitism is Trump's justification for all repression. What are you talking about?
> It's not random at all: there's a clear lineage between evangelical and Jewish belief systems.
LOL. It's random in the sense that you keep insisting that there is no causal connection between Israel's interest and the support it receives. Somehow for some lucky coincidence they get a lot of money and privileges but hey, they've nothing to do with it!
Well I understand why you’re confused about GOP anti-semitism because you’re clearly not American, so your read on American culture and politics is a little janky to say the least.
When did I say there’s no causal connection between Israel’s interest and the support it receives?
Again: not a lucky coincidence! It’s the furthest thing from a coincidence.
But it’s also not because the GOP loves Jews.
Are you reading the words in front of you? Because it seems like you’re responding to comments that only you can see.
> here are a half dozen examples or so of anti-semitism within the upper ranks of the GOP
I checked the article and I don't see any upper ranks of the GOP mentioned. Carlson is a media personality, Fuentes a far right influencer completely outside of the GOP, the Young Republican leaders are junior activists. The article actually reports of Republican Jewish Coalition leaders (such an antisemitic party!) lamenting an explosion of antisemitic episodes- which of course serves to justify even more censorship of voices critical of Israel within and without the party.
Sure, but I don't think we have any evidence the administration has a problem with you. Nor do they have a problem with anti-semitism itself. They have a problem with the people I mentioned.
My anecdote is that my wife and I are the only people who live in a large condotel (https://www.investopedia.com/terms/c/condotel.asp) in Florida mostly year round[1]. Everyone else who owns units see them as investments/second homes.
When the owners got together once a year or on FB you could tell that most of them were pro-Trump and I just kept quiet to keep the peace. But now every single one of them and the management company are seeing their rental rates plummet with the drop in tourism because people from especially Canada are not coming down to Florida during the winter. But also tourism has dropped from other countries.
Still none of the owners will address the elephant in the room and the property management company has to address it. But they walk on eggshells.
[1] We only leave for extended periods of time during spring break and the summer when rates are high because of spring break and summer break and we travel and I work remotely anyway.
This whole thing worldwide will lead to division in the society and to people having secret social media accounts. Only the most lazy and stupid ones will be handing over their private data to any gov security forces.
With so much browser fingerprinting and the biggest social networks being US companies, I wouldn't be surprised if already a company like Palanti has a dataset with all your history
They don't need fingerprinting, all the American social media has probably already been given a sealed FISA order to hand over account lists with ip access logs.
I feel like it's the same as the "I am not a terrorist" declaration check-box. You know your socials, they know your socials. They want to see if you lie.
What do you mean, secret? Your every action online is stored in massive data centres either operated by the US government or American mega corporations.
I can’t believe people STILL believe there is anonymity left online!
Unless you take some “enemy of the state”(great movie btw) level actions, they know everything worth knowing about you.
The government will be able to bury the impact of its international tourism pariah status in some sort of claim about people not wanting to fill this in. But the reality is visitor numbers are going to tank no matter what.
People from the UK in particular visit the USA because it is the USA: brash, welcoming, colourful, vibrant, thriving, free, fun. It's a holiday from being reserved and quiet. Things are louder, bigger and brighter, less apologetic, more colourful.
I guess it is low on the administration's priority list, but Trump is building a USA that no one from the UK in particular will want to visit. You should see the comments on the increasingly desperate attempts to advertise discount flights on Facebook. We'll go elsewhere.
> who advocate for, aid, or support designated foreign terrorists and other threats to national security; or who perpetrate unlawful anti-Semitic harassment or violence
The regime will simple classify pro-LBQT, anti-MAGA, and anti-Trump comments as "threats to national security" or as supporting terrorism.
Also funny how anti-Semitic harassment is emphasized, while other forms such as anti-black or anti-Latino harassment is not.
> Also funny how anti-Semitic harassment is emphasized, while other forms such as anti-black or anti-Latino harassment is not.
That's because they're using "perpetuating antisemitism" as code for "being mean to Israel". It's not really about fighting discrimination, that's just a cover framing which sells better than mandatory allegence to a foreign state.
The free market is the one with the winners they've chosen. And the winner is Israel and the losers are all the other minorities.
I'm not antisemitic, I'm anti-killing-in-general; I'm anti-collateral-damage; I'm anti-kidnapping-of-anyone-especially-children. I could go on.
There's a lot of bad on both sides. Only acknowledging the bad on one side is a denial of reality, and denying reality is never a sustainable position.
> The regime will simple classify pro-LBQT, anti-MAGA, and anti-Trump comments as "threats to national security" or as supporting terrorism.
Did they not already?
Antifa, which doesn't exist as a formal organization, literally means "anti-fascism" and is now a terrorist organization. Of course these are the same people who want to arrest people for treason when they said "You do not have to follow illegal orders"
It's just mental gymnastics of Olympic-level proportions.
Another buckwild measure for absolutely nothing. Since being directly affected by this in my real life, my resentment for these measures has grown ten-fold. These enforcement agents are costing my family friends everything in real value and real sentimental time.
Because of recent anti-immigration measures in the new Administration, a great Mexican family friend of mine has a dying uncle here in the States - with only a few months to live. And with a vast majority of his relatives in Mexico, almost none of them can get visa approval to see him and say goodbye. Not even Humanitarian Parole program visas are being accepted for ANY one of the family members; and they are good, upstanding people who took the process seriously.
I have absolutely nothing nice to say about the rule-writers for immigration in this Administration - and most past ones, and I have nothing mean to say about otherwise law-abiding illegal immigrants in America - until the process for legal immigration becomes necessarily easier.
So, hypothetically, if I were to say that the Israeli government is committing genocide and Trump is a fascist, would they not let me in? Well, I don't want to travel to the US while it's reigned by a fascist government anyways, so let's go: The Israeli government is committing genocide and Trump is a fascist.
Your comment history is very odd. You talk about America as though you are a citizen but several of your comments have grammatical errors that indicate you are a foreigner.
Your comment history is very odd. Your grammar is always perfect as though you are well-reasoned, but this very comment of yours shows you committing an ad hominem fallacy, shifting attention from the argument to something irrelevant about the person, indicating that you are a Pedantic ad hominem attacker.
I visited in June 2025, roadtrip down the West coast. I was somewhat concerned about immigration, but surprised we were able to use the Mobile Passport Control app and utilise the fast-line to skip a 3~ hour immigration queue.
I was surprised at how few international tourists there were. I had read about a decline, but everywhere we went felt quite empty...
On the other hand, the actual conversations I hear my friends having about business-trips to US are more stressed than conversation my dad used to have with my mom when he was traveling to do business for banks in India, Pakistan or Russia decade or two ago.
I suspect that much of the hysteria surrounding the tightening of border controls is a result of selective reporting. We weren't bombarded with articles about people being sent to secondary inspection or denied entry prior to this year. I travel internationally a fair bit and was also nervous traveling into the US this year, but having gone through multiple times now, I haven't seen any change in the process aside from the supporting documentation for my (rather uncommon) visa being looked at more systematically than before. That said, this change in entry requirements sounds like a substantial step up.
> I suspect that much of the hysteria surrounding the tightening of border controls is a result of selective reporting.
A >0.01% chance of being indefinitely detained and eventually deported/expelled is actually a risk that people are rational to consider when traveling to the US. Low probability * extremely high penalty = medium risk.
The fact that <99.99% of travel is routine does not change that calculation.
I would not be afraid to go to Russia two decades ago. It was fairly safe, unless you did something stupid. Going there now would be profoundly stupid.
My friends travelled to India two decades ago as tourists, it was fairly normal thing to do.
You seem to be one of those silly people who conflate antisemitism with disliking how the state of Israel behaves under the leadership of Benjamin Netanyahu.
You’re forgetting about all of the Evangelical Christians who think that if Isreal is not protected, Jesus won’t have a place to come back to when he returns (yes they think this)
And the Young Republicans are real live anti semite Nazi sympathizers and JD Vance made all sorts of excuses for them.
Evangelical's obsession with Israel is pretty weird (even to other Christians)..
They happily ignore Revelation 14:6? Hebrews 8:13 & 8:9? Galatians 3:28? Mark 16:1
Additionally, Christ commands Christians to preach the gospel to every nation and the scripture not say there is neither gentile or Jews.
Evangelicals will fixate on a verse from Genesis about God blessing people who bless Israel, but ignore the fact that when the country literally didn’t exist as a political entity.
The media is generally fairly complacent about it - the drama is good ratings material. And you can't link angry blue sky posts or substacks really.
Occasionally someone does comment about it and get flagged, ofc? and this article is part of the news about it, just like the discussion of the WB buy out and how paramount was going to offer trump control of a news channel for the same one or etc
I wonder if this is a media bubble thing, because basically all I see online is the opposite. The difference between the screaming outrage there and the complete absence of news reporting it tends to get pretty freaky.
I mean, we've got 20 point swings in special elections and mass protests ranging from large to huge all over the place and you'd barely know if you were looking at the evening news.
Yeah, the Reddit front page (not logged in) is always 50% full of politics and raging about how much this admin sucks. Yet in real life for 99% of people it's business as usual, no observable change, you'd have no idea anything was going on.
I wonder if the raging about it online has a cooling effect that makes people less likely to take irl action. Even if you do enter the left media bubble, you can't help but think that they've accomplished absolutely nothing. The "protests" (more like "100 people had a picnic in front of the capital") were pretty pathetic.
That's part of what I mean, actually. You go downtown here on the last big weekend they organized, and its 10 blocks of shouting people in a small/mid sized city, media representation at the local level was good - there is still a newspaper here - on the evening news it was a 10 second clip, and outside of that - "personalities" talking about the whole event nationally and a 30 second spot on Seattle and New York?
Like, compare some pictures of these protests to the 4 guys with a sign locally during Iraq?
Political discussions have always been frowned upon in HN. Any discussion just leads to whataboutism. What’s the point?
On the other hand, this is what a large part of the country has always been about. The establishment has just been able to keep the worse parts of it down and do everything through dog whistles instead of outright racism.
I’ve seen people afraid to talk about politics for financial reasons. Everything from Micheal Jordan’s “Republicans buy shoes too” to James Thompson of Stratechery who euphemizes that Trump is “transactional” instead of just outright saying “he openly accepts bribes from companies” - referencing the $15 million Paramount gave him directly for the merger to go through.
> Even here on Hacker News. It's just not discussed. US citizens are either championing MAGA or just acting like everything is normal or they're disinterested.
That is BS. Hacker News is full of it. My FB feed is full of it. The US media I see is full of it. Anything but silence.
> Even here on Hacker News. It's just not discussed. US citizens are either championing MAGA or just acting like everything is normal or they're disinterested.
Or their accounts were banned for being too contrarian, or they were systematically downvoted into invisibility.
HN won't even let me comment on the parent claim that US citizens are taking the situation passively. Which is horribly untrue. But the limit is a great example of a platform's rules (whether intentional or not) causing an important public perception.
Almost the only thing I have is LinkedIn, which is always only as up to date as the last time I changed jobs, which I don't do often.
No Facebook, insta, snap, twitter, tiktok. I subscribe to maybe five channels on YouTube.
My HN account isn't linked to my main 'identity' email address so I could hide it just by having a clean phone (which I do for international travel anyway).
I feel like I'd be suspicious due to the lack of traceability. I've had work colleagues say that they couldn't find a trace of me online (although that was a while ago now, and not colleagues who are adept at online sleuthing).
My age may be just enough to be believably not terminally online.
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