Many countries in the European Union, previously our strongest and longest international allies, have no issued travel advisories against the United States. Among them are Ireland, the United Kingdom, Germany, the Netherlands, Denmark, and Finland. These are richest and most influential countries in Europe and have the highest tourism rates for the United States.
Travel advisories against the United States have happened before, even recently. In 2019 and 2020, Uruguay, Venezuela, and Japan all issued travel advisories urging their citizens to postpone or cancel any trips to the US, though, considering what these advisories actually said, this was mostly due to widespread discrimination and hate, as well as frequent incidents of murder and gun violence towards Latin Americans and Asian Americans.
These advisories are much different. They don’t pertain to any particular danger of being in the US but instead warn against what is now American government policy under the Trump administration. One part of it is certainly the overtly pro-Russian sentiment and behavior of the Trump administration, as well as tariffs which have now been placed on the EU. But, more concerningly, the largest concern listed in these advisories is that tourists and foreign citizens could be arrested with no way to reclaim them.
Already, before Trumps first 100 days in office, multiple Germans visiting the US, as well as a British tourist are known to have been arrested and detained in the US. The governments of their home countries, as well as their families, have no way to contact them, and rather than trying to make amends, the state department has doubled down, saying that US border officials have the final and only say on who is allowed to enter the US.
Along with that, these advisories also say that nonbinary, transgender, and intersex Europeans attempting to enter the US will need to register under their biological sex at birth rather than how they would be legally described in Europe, with no recognition given to their chosen identities even if they had undergone medical and surgical treatments.
These assorted countries combined represent about 37% of foreign tourism to the United States, which is now very likely to steeply decrease unless the Trump regime folds on these policies. That loss in tourism, together with the international tariffs, will hurt the American economy even more and lose American jobs. When viewed from the EU, these advisories mean the United States is now described as equally dangerous to travel to as China, a communist dictatorship, Saudi Arabia, a monarchy, and Mexico, our southern neighbor who republicans frequently decry for it’s supposed lawlessness and danger.
