I think the concern is the uncertainty. Look border guards of any country are given a fair amount of discretion in determining whether a non-citizen should be allowed into the country. There is an assumption I think by most travellers, and perhaps many on this forum that if you are a law abiding person who has never breached any visa conditions, and meet all relevant visa conditions for the country you are travelling to you should generally be allowed into a country. When that discretion becomes weaponized it creates uncertainty when travelling. Everyone on this forum has done or said something at some point in their life that has offended someone or some people. Now if that becomes weaponized and used as an excuse to prevent you from entering a country like the US then that should be cause for concern. The United States has already cancelled the visas of 300 people on student visas so far, for things like a minor traffic infraction like failing to come to a complete stop at a stop sign or exercising their first amendment rights. This is completely unusual for a democracy. As someone who was on a student visa in Australia, it never occurred to me that I could be deported and have my student visa cancelled for failing to come to a complete stop at a stop sign and I think if Home Affairs did that, there would be an outcry by the Australian public. In the United States, things are more muted. That should be cause for concern.
No, the insinuation was that the deportation and visa cancellation was arbitrary.
I sincerely hope you are right that this is only one side of the story and that when the whole truth is known such decisions won't in reality be arbitrary and capricious. However, given what we are seeing elsewhere in the US (i.e. uncertainty in the markets caused by on again off again tariffs) is it not unreasonable for me to infer that this pattern would apply elsewhere given the anecdotes we've seen so far?
Of course it is. Simply, what did homeland security know about him that we didn't. As we do not know that it's just a one sided story.
You need only look at the number of travellers on the transpacific routes for your answer. Anyone complain they were deported this weekend?
I was very interested to read that traveller's firsthand account of the incident in the Traveller letters this morning:
As someone else mentioned, there are always two sides to a story. So now that we've heard the traveller's side, it would be interesting to see the CBP's view on this. Perhaps they know something the traveller doesn't and doesn't want to share it with them. Obviously they likely won't disclose their reasons for this scrutiny.
Sounds good to me.
And the problem would be?
No issue for me. I’m happy to do whatever a country requires
For those who think it won’t happen to me had an interesting conversation with my friend/neighbour this week.
Given the audience here it’s probably only a matter of time until it happens to one of us if this story is genuine.
and there will still be some people who won't believe it because "they don't have CBPs side of the story"
That's the precise reason that I might not return the the US while the current government is in place.
