For many, visiting America is the opportunity of a lifetime.
The chance to explore the bright lights of New York, the vast wildernesses of the Midwest or the wild theme parks of Florida take millions of tourists to the US every year.
But for some, that dream has turned into a nightmare, and instead of spending relaxing days on the beach, they have been locked up for weeks in jail.
Handcuffed, strip-searched and held in concrete cells by newly empowered US control, these people have found themselves detained over the smallest of details.
This week, two young German tourists found themselves detained and deported for not having any accommodation booked when they arrived in Hawaii.
And in March one British backpacker found herself locked up for nearly three weeks after allegedly having the wrong type of visa when she tried to enter the US from Canada.
The British government has even warned that travellers could face being arrested or detained if they fail to abide by rules which are being strictly enforced by US border agents.
Since January there has been a growing number of cases of European holidaymakers being caught up in Donald Trump’s border crackdown.
British graphic artist Rebecca Burke was detained for nearly three weeks after trying to cross the border between the US and Canada in February
German travellers Charlotte Pohl, 19, and Maria Lepere, 18,were detained and deported after arriving in Hawaii despite having a valid ESTA
The US president, who swept to power in last year’s election and was inaugurated on January 20, has vowed to kick hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants out of the country.
He has enacted a number of executive orders aimed at tightening border control, tightening visa vetting procedures and cracking down on undocumented migrants.
But while much of the focus has been on deporting criminals and alleged gang members, many of whom hail from Latin America, some well-meaning tourists have found themselves trapped in the vortex of the American’s immigration system.
There are growing signs that the political mood of America is affecting the appetite of tourists to go to the country.
UK residents make up the largest number of overseas visitors to the United States, with 3.9million people travelling across the pond each year.
But the number of visitors appears to be plummeting, with preliminary figures showing the number of British travellers to America plunged 14 per cent year on year in March.
And it’s a shocking decline that is mirrored elsewhere in Europe, with countries such as German, Spain and Norway all seeing double digit falls for March.
Visitor numbers from Denmark, which has been thrust into the news by Trump’s very public ambitions to takeover its territory of Greenland, plunged by 34 per cent in March.
The repercussions could be vast for American firms reliant on the tourist trade, with international visitors spending $253bn on US travel and tourism-related goods last year, according to the ITA.
And while millions will continue to travel there this year, for Rebecca Burke, a Briton who spent nearly three weeks in detention after trying to cross the border earlier year, the question is – why would you?
The 28-year-old graphic artist had been on a ‘once in a lifetime’ solo trip travelling across the US when she was handcuffed trying to cross the Canadian border on February 26.
She had already been staying with families in the US in return for carrying out household chores, and had a similar arrangement in Canada with a family awaiting her arrival in Vancouver.
But Canadian border officials said she needed a work visa to enter the country under that arrangement, and so sent her back to the US, where she was detained for being an illegal immigrant.
Rebecca was immediately placed in handcuffs and taken to a Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) processing centre in Tacoma, where she was seen wearing orange prison uniform and sleeping in a dormitory with more than 100 people.
She would spend nearly three weeks behind bars more than 5,000 miles from home, surviving on a diet of cold rice, potatoes and beans, before being released after desperate appeals from her family.
She has since claimed that even leaving the detention centre did not mean her ordeal was over, with officials strip-searching her at the airport before flying her back to Britain.
This week she told The Guardian that the documents she signed in the US mean she is now banned from going back for the next ten years.
Rebecca Burke was detained by ICE on suspicion of being an illegal immigrant after being turned back by Canadian border control. Pictured: Rebecca and her parents Andrea and Paul. Her parents have been fighting tirelessly to bring her back to the UK
Rebecca was held at a detention centre in Tacoma, Washington, where she was seen wearing an orange uniform
She told the paper she would warn other people not to travel to the US, saying: ‘First, because of the danger of what could happen to you. And, secondly, do you really want to give your money to this country right now?’
In March the UK government amended its travel advice to warn British travellers they face being arrested or detained if they break entry rules.
The Foreign Office states: ‘You should comply with all entry, visa and other conditions of entry. The authorities in the U.S. set and enforce entry rules strictly. You may be liable to arrest or detention if you break the rules.’
However, archived versions of the same website showed that at the beginning of February, the guidance had only stated: ‘The authorities in the U.S. set and enforce entry rules.’
When contacted by Reuters about the change last month, the Foreign Office declined to comment on the reason for the revision or confirm when exactly it took place.
It said its travel advice was designed to help people make decisions and the advice was constantly kept under review.
This has been mirrored by other European countries, with Germany changing travel advice to its citizens to warn that just having a visa or entry waiver – also known as an ESTA – does not mean you will automatically be allowed to enter the US.
And this was cast into sharp relief this week after a pair of female German travellers found themselves locked up despite having obtained an ESTA.
Canadian Jasmine Mooney, 35, was detained for nearly two weeks by US immigration officials after trying to enter the country from Mexico on March 3
German tattoo artist Jessica Brösche, 26, says she was left in solitary confinement for over a week after being arrested while trying to legally cross the US-Mexico border
Charlotte Pohl, 19, and Maria Lepere, 18, had arrived in Honolulu, Hawaii, to begin their trip but were grilled extensively by Customs and Border Protection.
The pair planned to explore before travelling on to California and Costa Rica, but they hadn’t booked any accommodation for their five-week stay in Hawaii, German news outlet Ostee-Zeitung originally reported.
It was the lack of planning that alerted CBP, with the two accused of having plans to work illegally during their stay. They were placed in handcuffs and taken to what they later found to be a deportation detention centre, Beat of Hawaii reported.
Their experience was described as shocking and surreal, according to the outlet, after they were strip searched, had full body scans, and were handed green prison uniforms.
Conditions in the facility were said to have left them sleeping on mouldy mattresses, rudimentary toilet facilities, and being warned by guards to avoid eating expired food.
The following morning, the young travellers were taken back to Honolulu airport and deported. Pohl and Lepere requested deportation to Japan.
They are not the only European tourists to have been affected by the crackdown, with multiple reports of fellow German holidaymakers being locked up for weeks at a time.
Jessica Brösche, 26, spent over six weeks locked up, including over a week in solitary confinement, after she was stopped at the Tijuana crossing on January 25.
Jasmine Mooney, who starred in American Pie, was detained by ICE for nearly two weeks
The German tattoo artist was arrested by US Customs and Border Protection while trying to walk through a checkpoint in San Diego.
Brösche was travelling with her American friend Nikita Lofving as a tourist under the ESTA visa waiver program. The two had met in Tijuana and were carrying tattooing equipment.
Immigration officials reportedly accused Brösche of working in the US the last time she entered the country with the ESTA program, an electronic system that determines whether someone is eligible to enter the US without a visa.
Lofving told the outlet she asked officials if Brösche could be sent back to Mexico, but they said she would be deported to Germany in three to five days because she could not offer proof of residence in the Latin American country.
But Brösche says she spent days in a cell at the San Diego border before she was taken into ICE custody and brought to the the Otay Mesa Detention Center, where she has been held for more than a month.
‘I just want to get home, you know? I’m really desperate,’ she told ABC 10. Her detainment included a ‘horrible’ eight days in solitary confinement, she added. She would later be deported on March 6.
Canadian actress Jasmine Mooney was denied entry into the country while trying to make her way from Mexico to San Diego, California after her work visa was revoked back in November while travelling from Vancouver to Los Angeles.
She was hurled into jail on March 3 and spent 12 days in detention, claiming it felt like she had been ‘kidnapped’ and trapped in an experiment. She told ABC10 ‘what is happening is so unjust and I know that there’s a better way to do this’.
A US Customs and Border police officer stands guard at the San Ysidro Port of Entry in 2020
Travel experts have now warned that the US could experience a downturn in tourism, something that appears to be backed up by the preliminary arrival figures, due to the perceived ‘difficult or unpredictable’ entry requirements.
Neri Karra Sillaman, an entrepreneurship expert at Oxford University, told Fast Company: ‘Even if you get a visa, you have the risk of being detained or to be denied.’
Paul English, co-founder of travel website Kayak, told the Financial Times: ‘In just two months [Trump] has destroyed the reputation of the US, shown one way by diminished travel from the EU to the US.
‘This is not only one more terrible blow to the US economy, it also represents reputation damage that could take generations to repair.’
In March, Secretary of State Marco Rubio issued a statement in an attempt to diminish travel fears.
He said: ‘If you’re not coming to the United States to join a Hamas protest, or to come here and tell us about how right Hamas is, or… stir up conflict on our campuses and create riots in our streets and vandalise our universities, then you have nothing to worry about.’
Meanwhile, Tricia McLaughlin, spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, previously said: ‘The Trump administration is enforcing immigration laws – something the previous administration failed to do.
‘Those who violate these laws will be processed, detained and removed as required.’
