For the record, I'm no fan of ICE/CBP, but it looks like they're just enforcing the law here.
Putting her in a literal prison and in an orange jumpsuit is overkill. Clearly she just screwed up and thought what she was doing was ok, but isn't a threat. Let her go back to the UK and no longer be eligible for ESTA. How is that not sufficient?
The problem with any immigration service in the world is that they are dealing with non-citizens which lack most protections citizenship would have given them — which means that it may take its sweet time before courts actually hear her defense and probably decide as you suggest (along with introducing a 3 or 5 year ban on entering the US).
It creates yet another person who will come to rightfully hate the US, gets bad press affecting tourism and business, and for what? For a girl that loved the US, misinterpreted or misunderstood something and is staying a little longer, spending more money and having good experiences.
Enforce the law, sure, whatever, but the jumpsuit and 10 days in a detention center are barbaric and unnecessary. There's a reason this wouldn't have happened before a wannabe dictator was in power.
Should they have put her on house arrest in a hotel room? She doesn't deserve special privileges. A huge swath of the US population would be adamantly against her being treated special.
This does not mean US should not work to improve those conditions for everyone — I don't see a difference between a Mexican person overstaying or her overstaying from the angle of immigration clerks — it should! US should also certainly adapt laws to avoid any "detention" for people open to "voluntary deportation".
In my non-EU European country, arbitrary application of laws is exactly what's the issue. This leads to rampant corruption and society going crazy (it's not about being a good citizen, it's about not getting caught being a bad one).
So what are you proposing? Giving someone from an European country better treatment than someone from South America? Sounds like racism/white privilege to me.
>It creates yet another person who will come to rightfully hate the US, gets bad press affecting tourism and business, and for what? For a girl that loved the US
South Americans are fleeing prosecution from drug gangs or economic devastation. That's a far stronger justification than some girl who "loved the US" and wants to backpack for a few months.
>misinterpreted or misunderstood something and is staying a little longer, spending more money and having good experiences.
As other people have mentioned, it's basically plastered everywhere during the ESTA process that you can't work. "misinterpreted or misunderstood" seems like a stretch.
... I am us citizen presenting with us passport, look and talk extremely white with no foreign accent.
Historically, (as in: during periods where Trump is not president) it is not.
No, the proposal is to treat all such cases equivalently, regardless of national origin.
That means no more prison/orange jump suit/inacessibility for Europeans or people from South America who screw up their visa conditions.
And in this case, it's not about "special priviledges", it's about the ridiculousness of this process being applied to anyone in her circumstances.
It's what it is under Trump. 3 months ago Someone in this situation wouldn't have been detained for this long and in the news for such a minor offense.
> This does not mean US should not work to improve those conditions for everyone
This wasn't happening before for cases like this. All the worst CBP agents are empowered now and have no checks on their authority. That's the problem.
No one is proposing anything like this. Why invent a strawman?
> "misinterpreted or misunderstood" seems like a stretch.
Not if you consider work to mean getting cash in exchange.
Edit: just remembered the time they were enraged they had to let me in so threatened to revoke my passport.
Why? On what basis?
Your description of "a girl that loved the US, misinterpreted or misunderstood something and is staying a little longer, spending more money and having good experiences" might not have any explicit racial/ethnic element, but it's pretty obvious you're selecting for a certain demographic when you're using criteria like that.
Or are you arguing that nobody should be treated that way? In which case why not just say something like "nobody should be treated this way", instead of qualifying it with so many descriptors?
The point was discretion should have been used this care regardless of other times it has been.
You seem to be replying to the wrong comment. I never said anything remotely like that.
[1]: https://www.aclu.org/documents/constitution-100-mile-border-...
It's not just about security, they admitted they fuck with innocent people just for enjoyment. They cannot be stopped as the courts don't really see them as beholden to the Constitution, it's a huge legal hole and the officers have a crystal clear understanding of this.
This is also why when they needed an unbeholden army to send to Portland to pick up protesters in unmarked vans, they used CBP.
https://holdcbpaccountable.org/2016/08/09/cervantes-v-united...
They were drilled for hours until finally they let them in: it required producing a lot of paperwork by the company hosting the event on top of the traveller's documentation.
If you've not passed US border control as a foreigner, you really have no idea of what a pleasant experience it... is not.
Being locked up in a detention center for days (and in solitary confinement in at least one recent case) for this sort of violation would have been rare to non-existent.
I crossed the US border many times as a foreigner, although I am now a citizen. The easiest kind of foreigner though - white, anglo, male, middle class. Even those qualifications don't seem like enough to stop the absurd responses from ICE anymore, though.
I get it that US could be nicer, but it was Canada who denied entry first (the girl was coming into Canada after being in the US for weeks prior to that).
I just don't think this has changed due to Trump: I could very well see this happening prior to Trump.
Somebody mentioned how average detainee wait for a court date is 50 days! Trump has not been in power long enough to bring the average that high.