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French scientist denied entry into the U.S., French government says
- gnabgib 2y agoDiscussion (113 points, 21 hours ago, 51 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43416476 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43416476
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- linguae 2y agoI was waiting to respond until I saw this reported from a source like Reuters. This is very scary. I’m an American community college instructor in Silicon Valley who does research with domestic and international colleagues; in fact, I will be in Japan this summer as a visiting researcher. If people could be denied entry to the United States over harmless political opinions shared electronically, then this hurts our ability to collaborate in-person with foreign researchers in the United States, and this also hurts our ability to hold academic conferences here. It’s one thing if the scientist made threats or advocated overthrow; that is not protected free speech. But if it’s just an opinion or even name-calling, then this denial of entry is flatly wrong and flatly un-American. Perhaps it’s time for prominent US academic conferences with international attendees to move to Canada, France, Japan, or some other place where scientists and science in general are not under attack by their government.
- klipt 2y agoI'm curious what the line is. If someone says "Trump is violating the constitution and should be impeached", is that advocating overthrow? Or just suggesting a way to work within the system? If someone says "presidential democracies are historically unstable, the US would do better under a parliamentary system" is that advocating overthrow? When Trump said "Proud Boys stand back and stand by" was he advocating overthrow?
- goatlover 2y agoI would say Trump should be removed from office before he does too much damage to US democracy, peacefully if possible. I'm not advocating anything other than protecting the Constitution, and there are two other branches of government that can act to protect it.
- chrisco255 2y agoIt was Biden that damaged the democracy by allowing unchecked, unlimited immigration into the country, even going as far as to subsidize and pay for accommodations in luxury hotels in NYC. No country can stand on that kind of policy for long. No country in history ever has.
- goatlover 2y agoImmigrants are a boogeyman. The US is a massive country with a huge economy. Most of them are seeking better opportunities by doing jobs Americans don't want to do. There have always been waves of immigrants since the US was founded. And it's not true that Biden allowed unlimited immigration. At any rate, this is just a distraction from how the Trump administration has been seeking to consolidate executive power unconstitutionally since taking office a 2nd time.
- chrisco255 2y ago> Most of them are seeking better opportunities by doing jobs Americans don't want to do No, there are no jobs Americans don't want to do. As you say, its a massive country with 300 million people, there's a diverse set of skills and labor pool here. They just want market-level wages to do them. There's been migration, it's been largely controlled migration for the past 120 years, with no expectation that migrants would be subsidized and provided with shelter, cell phones, etc. or that we'd allow gangs from Venezuela to establish footholds and allow human and drug trafficking to pass through completely unchecked. There is nothing Trump has done that any previous president hasn't already done. Presidents have a lot of power under the Constitution and even more that Congress has delegated to them over the years.
- joshuaheard 2y agoI have not seen what he actually said. However, the agency is quoted in the article saying it wasn't "political". I also saw in another article that it involved "terrorism". Since Trump has had two assassination attempts, they have heightened scrutiny. As long as you don't advocate for violence, I'm sure you're fine.
- ashleyn 2y agoHas anyone checked the scientist's social media? Border agencies are known to monitor social media. If he did something like, say, express sympathy for Luigi Mangione or Tesla vandals, this would definitely dovetail with a "terrorism" rejection.
- goatlover 2y agoI don't understand how Tesla vandalism rises to the level of terrorism. It's protest in the form of vandalism. But this administration wants to misclassify any resistance.
- joshuaheard 2y agoProtest in the form of vandalism is terrorism. You have a First Amendment right to speech, but not to violence and destruction. The FBI defines terrorism as: "Violent, criminal acts committed by individuals and/or groups to further ideological goals stemming from domestic influences, such as those of a political, religious, social, racial, or environmental nature." Clearly, criminal trespass on someone's Tesla to discourage Elon Musk from taking actions against your ideological goals falls within that category.
- goatlover 2y agoI'd like to hear what a judge has to say about those definitions. Spray painting a wall could be considered terrorism under that definition
- jlebar 2y ago
- oceanhaiyang 2y agoWe just went to China and had zero issue coming back, if it offers any consolation.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- littlestymaar 2y ago[flagged]
- titzer 2y agoThey have no problem lying in bold letters and are absolutely not embarrassed one bit when caught out on it.
- MrMcCall 2y agoLiars lie. That's what they do. It is our personal responsibility to learn what is true and what is false, and then hold both ourselves and our elected leaders to that standard. For the good of community, its citizens and visitors, and the world at large.
- cryptonector 2y agoWhile I think this case is silly (bad), First Amendment protections are only available for U.S. citizens and to a lesser extent to permanent residents (we've seen that permanent residents can have their permanent residency canceled). EDIT: To be clear foreigners can't be imprisoned in the U.S. for their speech any more than a citizen, but unlike a citizen they can be removed from the U.S. because of their speech. Also, this is an action by CBP, not by the POTUS. I seriously doubt there was any order by POTUS regarding the speech of foreigners abroad. Most likely this is just a zealous CBP agent making this decision. I've been given the third degree by immigration officers in the U.S. and Canada, and it always felt very random.
- basisword 2y ago>> First Amendment protections are only available for U.S. citizens Given Musk and Vance have lectured other countries on 'free speech' I think this argument no longer works. If they're so invested in the rules on speech in various European countries they're hypocrites when they deny it to foreign nationals.
- cryptonector 2y agoDemanding that Europe have free speech for their citizens is not the same thing as demanding that Europe have free speech for non-citizens. Sophistry doesn't help in controversial times, IMO.
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- atum47 2y agoI've read that on Reddit and I'm now reading that Britain issued a travel warning... Adding that up plus all the things that can happen until next month, would you consider it safe for a Brazilian to visit the US is this climate? Update: typos
- burkaman 2y agoYes in that statistically you would probably be fine, over a million Brazilian tourists come to the US every year. No in that it is much less safe to visit today then it was a year ago, and authorities will specifically be targeting people who look South American. If you closely follow the rules of the visa you're using and you don't do anything to stand out, as in you just have a normal-looking tourist itinerary, then you'll probably be fine. If it's just a vacation I would probably pick somewhere else this year though.
- ty6853 2y agoI get put in secondary almost every time and it is pretty much always jam packed with sad people, although I am usually the only English speaker so I have trouble finding out what happened exactly. Sometimes they sit in chairs next to me, other times in immigration holding cell next to me. The incidence rate of something traumatizing happening has to be closer to 1+%
- aaomidi 2y agoDo you have tattoos? If so probably stay away for now...
- briandear 2y agoOnly if they are TdA or MS13 tattoos and the person entered illegally, otherwise, no problem.
- Griffinsauce 2y agoDo you know or want this to be the facts? Because the main problem right now is that it's an unknown.
- JKCalhoun 2y agoRemembering my mom's hippy friend when the Vietnam "conflict" was in full swing. He had tattooed "Fuck the USA" on the "saluting edge" of his right hand. It apparently worked as a deterrent to being drafted. (I understand it was costly to remove after the draft was over.) If someone wanted to make a statement or make a point about the free U.S., one wonders what creative things one could assign as their phone wallpaper before going through customs.
- ty6853 2y agoI would only do this if you want to get strip searched, shackled, chained, driven around in a prisoner van, examined by doctors at your expense then released a day later without apology. Make sure your affairs are in order to be disappeared, before crossing. I'm still in 4 figure debt from the last made up reason a CBPO used to fuck with me.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- SauciestGNU 2y agoI've gotten the enhanced screenings but I still am amused by the notion of a "this prostate is an IED" tattoo.
- alfiedotwtf 2y ago$2000 and flying 11 hours to get to LAX only to be turned around is a pretty expensive statement to make unless you did it as some sort of political stunt
- JKCalhoun 2y agoYou say "stunt" like it's a useless gesture. Pretty sure there are YouTubers that could swing the $2K for the clicks.
- alfiedotwtf 2y ago
- donnachangstein 2y agoFriendly reminder that if you have a DUI in your past, you WILL be refused admittance into Canada.
- 0xTJ 2y agoThis isn't even remotely relevant to this discussion. Being convicted of a crime is not the same as expressing critical opinions.
- donnachangstein 2y agoEvery country on planet Earth has their own rules and they all have every right to tell any non-citizen entering to fuck off at their whims. Sorry but that's how it works. The sense of entitlement here is mind-boggling. If I fly to $COUNTRY they have every right to put me on the next plane back for any reason (including pissing off customs in any way) and I have no recourse beyond shouting into the void.
- anonymousDan 2y agoJust to be clear, you're perfectly fine with this?
- tromp 2y agoPeople are not arguing whether US has the right; but whether they had good reason. As in, a better reason than disliking criticism of the administration or its policies (or name calling).
- kyleee 2y agoThe article provides no details to assess whether or not there was good reason, so this is really quite a futile overall conversation.
- 0xTJ 2y agoAnd everyone has a right to be excessively rude towards customer service employees. That doesn't mean that it's considered acceptable, or that others shouldn't be critical of people who do that.
- EA-3167 2y agoDupe https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43416476#43417713 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43416476#43417713 (74 comments)
- _cs2017_ 2y agoFor comparison's sake, this is what the UK does: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=991kRp8KUmo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=991kRp8KUmo
- briandear 2y agoTrump isn’t the president of the UK so the international media doesn’t care.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- briandear 2y agoThe only source is the French government? Nowhere can we find the name of the specific scientist, nor do we have any facts other than the word of the French government official (who wasn’t there.) The fact that the FBI was also called in tells me that there is a lot more to this story than what Reuters is reporting.
- briandear 2y ago[flagged]
- indrora 2y agoThe US is notable for its freedom of speech and expression in its constitution. The kinds of remarks made by this French citizen would have to constitute active, meaningful threats against the state (read: more than just "The US president is a dumbass") to fall outside of our freedom of speech laws. I can tell my elected officials "I hope you choke on that grape". I can't tell my elected officials "I'm going to make you choke on that grape".
- enigma101 2y agoJD sitting in the WH not two weeks ago lecturing the UK about free speech. Check
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- kyleee 2y agoTone it down, you are right on the verge of committing a non-crime hate incident.
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- rldjbpin 2y agoalong the same lines, a student's visa got revoked due to protesting an "unsuitable" side in the Gaza war. [1] in the past having a contrarian opinion would get you ostracised or fired maybe. but restricting access post grant is a new trend in the wrong direction. [1] https://www.dhs.gov/news/2025/03/14/video-columbia-university-student-whose-visa-was-revoked-supporting-hamas-and https://www.dhs.gov/news/2025/03/14/video-columbia-universit...