Comment by pavlov
9 months ago
I lived there for years as a legal resident. During Covid I got a national interest exception allowing me to return to USA from Europe while the border was closed to non-citizens. So I have reason to believe my immigration sheet is clean.
I’m still afraid to go back now. It seems like they’re simply making an example by throwing random people into weeks of detention at the border. A green card holder credibly claims he was tortured over a decade-old marijuana misdemeanor on his record.
Needless to say this perception is pretty bad for American tourism, business travel, conferences, etc.
The woman who had anti-Trump photos on her phone. The woman who had "sympathetic" photos of Hezbollah on the phone. The professor who attended a Pro-Palestinian protest.
I don't get it. I thought we were free speech people. Now we are literal thought police? Since when is it illegal to have a picture on your phone that isn't CSAM?
And before people ask, yes I believe in free speech for everyone, even people I dislike and don't agree with.
> I thought we were free speech people
The US were never the land of free speech (or of the free). It's all marketing.
>The woman who had "sympathetic" photos of Hezbollah on the phone Although I personally disagree with her, I think you're correct here. They clearly wanted to make an example of her.
>The professor who attended a Pro-Palestinian protest. This is disingenuous, he was the leader of the group that organizes those protests. In Europe, I probably wouldn't be welcome too long if I was the leader of a neo-nazi group while on a visa.
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