On Tuesday, U.S. Customs and Border Protection filed a proposal that would require tourists from 42 countries to submit up to five years of their social media history in order to enter the United States. The requirement will affect citizens from nations eligible for the U.S. Visa Waiver Program, which includes most European countries, as well as other developed nations such as Japan, South Korea, and Australia.
The program currently requires tourists from eligible countries to fill out a short application and pay a $40 fee before coming to the United States for up to 90 days without a visa. While the application has allowed visitors to list their social media accounts since 2016, this newest proposal will make doing so mandatory. In addition to submitting years of posts for analysis, prospective tourists may also have to provide years of telephone numbers, email addresses, IP addresses, and information about family members.
The proposal is not the first time the Trump administration has sought to use social media postings to bar individuals' entry to the United States. Earlier this year, Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced that he had revoked hundreds of international students' visas for anti-Israel speech or protest activity. "Every time I find one of these lunatics, I take away their visa," Rubio said during a March press conference. "We're looking every day for these lunatics that are tearing things up." In June, several U.S. embassies announced that student visa applicants would need to allow the U.S. government to snoop through their social media accounts.
Unsurprisingly, backlash to Tuesday's announcement was swift. "Requiring temporary visitors here for a vacation or business to surrender five years of their social media to the U.S. will send the message that the American commitment to free speech is pretense, not practice," the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, a free speech advocacy group, said in a statement posted to X on Wednesday. "This is not the behavior of a country confident in its freedoms."
The vagueness of the directive is most concerning. It's not at all clear what forms of speech will be considered disqualifying for a tourist seeking entry. Will speech in praise of terrorist groups get someone denied? What about criticism of Israel's war in Gaza? Or posts that simply criticize Trump or poke fun at the American health care system? While Trump's allies might delight in the ability to deny a Trump-hating foreigner the ability to visit America, a similar standard could easily be used by a future Democratic president to deny entry to vaccine skeptics or social conservatives.
It's also unclear how much time and money the government will spend on analyzing years of posts—not to mention a host of other personal information—that tourists are now expected to hand over. But there are other financial implications to consider: Instead of preventing terrorist sympathizers from entering the country, the proposal, if finalized, will likely deter or bar plenty of harmless tourists from coming to the U.S. and spending their money on American businesses.
"Setting aside how antithetical this is to American culture," former Rep. Justin Amash pointed out on X this week, "it's certain to damage tourism and lead to Americans being subjected to similar or even worse harassment when traveling abroad."
The post Want To Vacation In America? Trump Wants To See Your Social Media Posts First. appeared first on Reason.com.
