do not come to the united states, you safety, dignity, and sense of self, is not protected by the trump administration
My trip to the USA in 2016 was one of the most harrowing, dehumanising, and humiliating experiences of my life. And I’m talking specifically about the actual journey, i.e. after the already lengthy, painful process of acquiring a visa.
They treated me like a terrorist. I had to be escorted by 2 armed big dudes around the airport, and they flipped their shit when I reached for my phone to tell my brother it’d be a while before I can come out (just so he wouldn’t worry.) They went through my bag and were handling everything SUPER gently, asking if it was “safe” for them to touch it.
They then confiscated my passport, walked off, and literally never returned it to me. I spent hours asking various members of airport staff what to do because I was screwed. Thankfully, eventually one of them found it in a drawer and gave it back to me.
I was a minor BTW. I have had no desire to repeat the experience since.
Why yes, I’d love to pay an additional $250 fee to be shipped off to a gulag.
You can just use that $250 to get pegged by an escort and have a better experience.
Getting handled like a piece of shit at customs, having to pay an outrageous amount of money for the privilege, and can be “taken care of” by the US GeStaPo. Being a foreign tourist in the US is now more like masochism instead of a relaxing holiday.
I believe Netanyahu has nominated Trump for the “Tourism person of the year” award
So as a Canadian here is yet another reason to never visit the newest Oblast USA…
Putin prefers to call it “Amerika Oblast”.
I didn’t find anything about ESTA, it is not really a visa, but bit similar. Is that also going to be 250$ now? Previously that cost 21$
ESTA isn’t impacted yet by this as it currently only applies to non-immigrant visas. However the “Big Beautiful Bill Act” sets inflation tracked annual increases starting 2026, and the base price is set to raise to $40 sometime this year (I’m not totally sure on when).
Rebuilding the economy by :: checks my notes:: discouraging tourism. I think that officially fills my “how trump is going to fuck us” bingo card.
As well as spend 5-50000 days in custody anywhere from seatac to the Everglades concentration camp to the el Salvador concentration camp. The US occupied Guantanimo Bay facility is also on the table, though camp X ray is unlikely to be available
Department of tourism doing the lords woke. Braise jeasus.
Even if they would pay me $250, I wouldn’t want to go there.
The headline is misleading.
- It’s a refundable deposit
- It’s not for all travelers but only for those on non-immigrant visas. Most notably, does not apply for ESTA travelers
Do they say when it will be refunded though? Will it be refunded in cash or in TrumpBux? Isn’t Trump going to add a 200 dollars tax on it, because reasons?
I don’t call it the ‘land of the fee and home of the easy payment plan’ for nothing.
What’s funny is that a lot of countries do something like this, but it’s always a far lower price that is insignificant compared to the total vacation cost.
$250 on the other hand is so high that it would impact your vacation budget, specially for the US as it’s selling point is that it’s cheap compared to EU or other developed countries.
It’s refundable
US cheap? 10 bucks a beer cheap? I get five beers and five meals for that price in some areas of Europe.
A trip to Florida is so cheap for my Canadian standards.
I’m talking about flights, hotels and food compared to Western Europe.
I do understand Europe has cheap places and US has expensive ones, the above analysis is more about the past (from Canadian eyes) and not what US has turned into.
I have a feeling they are doing this for people applying for visa for the world cup next year. Last world cup, Qatar saw 3.4 million fan.
With this in place a d we assume third of that number attend the government is looking at maybe 250 million.
Which is paltry. Even if we get the same numbers, that’s only $850mil. That’s not even enough to fund the fucking cafeteria at the Pentagon.
