{"id":109236,"date":"2025-05-17T14:32:22","date_gmt":"2025-05-17T14:32:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/109236\/"},"modified":"2025-05-17T14:32:22","modified_gmt":"2025-05-17T14:32:22","slug":"some-german-tourists-fearing-harassment-or-detention-are-avoiding-u-s","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/109236\/","title":{"rendered":"Some German tourists, fearing harassment or detention, are avoiding U.S."},"content":{"rendered":"\n

BERLIN\u00a0\u2014\u00a0Jessica Lia Br\u00f6sche is a Berlin tattoo artist who was escaping the frigid German winter in the sunshine of northern Mexico. She planned to add a short trip across the border to visit a friend in Los Angeles. But she never made it.<\/p>\n

Br\u00f6sche was stopped by Immigration and Customs Enforcement when she tried to enter the United States near San Diego on Jan. 26 \u2014 six days after President Trump\u2019s inauguration. The 29-year-old German national was held at the Otay Mesa detention center for six weeks before she was allowed to fly home.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey treat you at the border like you\u2019re a criminal,\u201c Br\u00f6sche told The Times after returning to Berlin. \u201cI only wanted to visit a friend in L.A. for a few days.\u201d<\/p>\n

The German consulate did not comment on the case. In an email to the Associated Press, ICE did not discuss Br\u00f6sche\u2019s case in detail but said that \u201cif statutes or visa terms are violated, travelers may be subject to detention and removal<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

Br\u00f6sche\u2019s detention made headlines across Europe.<\/p>\n

\u201cBerlin woman endures \u2018horror story\u2019 in U.S. detention center while facing deportation,\u201d wrote one German newspaper. \u201cIs the USA cracking down on German tourists entering the country?\u201d wrote another.<\/p>\n

Br\u00f6sche\u2019s experience \u2014 and media reports of other Germans or Europeans being detained by immigration authorities \u2014 may have contributed to a chill in travel to the United States, which is normally one of the most popular overseas destinations for Germans, with more than 2 million visitors each year. <\/p>\n

There was an appreciable drop in visitors to the United States from Europe in March, after the Trump administration introduced an aggressive crackdown on immigration. The number of German visitors fell most precipitously \u2014 28% fewer in March compared to the previous March, according to data from the International Trade Administration, a German government agency. <\/p>\n

There were also far fewer Germans arriving in California in March, down 26% to 20,847 from March 2024, the agency said. <\/p>\n

Visit California, a nonprofit organization for tourism, recently lowered its forecast for 2025 spending by all visitors in the state by $6 billion to $160 billion after seeing the first quarter decline. <\/p>\n

\n

\u2018I don\u2019t want to take a chance of ending up stopped at the airport and then taken to a prison in El Salvador, with my hair shaved off and forced to kneel in line with prisoners.\u2019<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\u2014 Karolina Pieper, German citizen<\/p>\n

Reflecting diminished demand to visit California, airfares from Germany have fallen too. Seats on mid-summer round-trip flights from Berlin to Los Angeles can now be found for as little as $500, or about half as expensive as a year ago.<\/p>\n

The trend has raised alarm because visitors from abroad have an important impact on the U.S. economy \u2014 especially in California, one of the leading destinations for German tourists. <\/p>\n

\"A <\/p>\n

A banner featuring President Trump hangs near the entrance of the U.S. Department of Agriculture in Washington. There was an appreciable drop in visitors to the United States from Europe in March, after the Trump administration introduced an aggressive crackdown on immigration. <\/p>\n

(Mandel Ngan \/ AFP \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n

Adam Sacks, president of Tourism Economics, told The Times that his independent organization had lowered its forecast for tourism to the U.S. from a gain of 9% in 2025 to a drop of 9% because of the turbulence caused since Trump took office. <\/p>\n

\u201cSimply put, international leisure travelers have complete discretion on when and where they travel, and negative perceptions are reducing interest in visiting the U.S.,\u201c Sacks wrote in an email.<\/p>\n

Germans, who receive six weeks of paid vacation each year, are among the world\u2019s most hearty travelers and their absence this summer would likely be felt at California hot spots such as Universal Studios, Disneyland, beaches and Death Valley. Germans spent $112 billion on foreign travel in 2023, according to the United Nations World Tourism Organization, trailing only Chinese visitors ($197 billion) and Americans ($150 billion).<\/p>\n

\"Universal <\/p>\n

The absence of German tourists this summer would likely be felt at California hot spots such as Universal Studios. Germans spent $112 billion on foreign travel in 2023, according to the United Nations World Tourism Organization.<\/p>\n

(Amanda Villegas \/ For The Times)<\/p>\n

Residents of other countries have sworn off U.S. travel to protest Trump\u2019s policies on immigration, foreign affairs or tariffs. Many Canadians have been staying away, most notably from Palm Springs<\/a>, which usually hosts a large contingent of Canadians.<\/p>\n

The decline in German tourists, however, reflects not politics, but fear. <\/p>\n

Br\u00f6sche was widely quoted in the German press as saying that she was held in a small cell for nine days. \u201cBeing in solitary confinement was hard,\u201d she told The Times. \u201cI had headaches and started getting panic attacks. I was on the verge of losing it.\u201c The company that owns the detention center, CoreCivic, has denied she was held in such confinement.<\/p>\n

\u201cI love traveling to the States but I don\u2019t think I\u2019m going to risk it this year,\u201d said Karolina Pieper, a 39-year-old civil servant from Mainz who usually vacations in the United States three times each year. \u201cI don\u2019t want to take a chance of ending up stopped at the airport and then taken to a prison in El Salvador, with my hair shaved off and forced to kneel in line with prisoners.\u201d<\/p>\n

Germans with business dealings in the U.S. also report growing anxiety. Martin Moszkowicz, an executive at Constantin Film, said that some German actors and writers, who in the past had posted criticism of Trump on social media, were leery about traveling to the United States for fear of being detained.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is all creating a lot of uncertainty, and that is never good for business,\u201d Moszkowicz said. <\/p>\n

\"A <\/p>\n

A traveler waits inside the Delta Airlines terminal at Los Angeles International Airport. The number of German visitors to the United States was down 28% in March from the year before, according to data from the International Trade Administration, a German government agency.<\/p>\n

(Allen J. Schaben \/ Los Angeles Times)<\/p>\n

News reports of Germans undergoing special scrutiny when trying to enter the U.S. continue to circulate.<\/p>\n

A German electrical engineer named Fabian Schmidt, 34, has had a green card since 2008. But he was detained at Boston\u2019s Logan Airport when returning from a visit <\/a>to Germany on March 7 and held for two months. <\/p>\n

His mother, Astrid Senior, was quoted in German media reports saying he had been deprived of sleep, food and water when he was held for three weeks in detention in Rhode Island. She said the authorities would not let him have his anxiety medication and that his condition deteriorated to the point that he had to be taken to a hospital.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would have a real problem with all the stress going to the United States now,\u201d said Udo Grelzik, 64, a solar power entrepreneur from a Berlin suburb. \u201cAll these stories of Germans getting arrested at the border just for trying to visit on vacation. I couldn\u2019t handle the interrogation. My English isn\u2019t very good and I\u2019d be scared of saying something wrong. And then end up in jail just because I misunderstood something. No thanks.\u201d<\/p>\n

Grelzik said he will instead spend a few weeks this year in Canada. <\/p>\n

Br\u00f6sche said she was at first told by authorities that they suspected she was attempting to work illegally in the U.S. because she was traveling with her tattoo equipment, then told her that she had stayed longer than the 90 days allowed on her visa during a trip to Chicago two years ago. She said immigration authorities later told her that she had been caught trying to enter the U.S. illegally. <\/p>\n

Br\u00f6sche said all those statements were untrue. She did have her tattooing equipment, she said, but was planning to ink a fellow tattoo artist, not to work professionally.<\/p>\n

Others have reported being strip-searched, handcuffed and locked up, often without explanation.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was really humiliating,\u201d Maria Lepere, a 19-year-old German from Rostock who was detained along with her friend Charlotte Pohl, also 19, at the Honolulu airport for 24 hours in March. <\/p>\n

Lepere insisted she and Pohl had valid visas, but a Customs and Border Protection official quoted in the New York Post said the pair had attempted to enter the United States \u201cunder false pretenses<\/a>,\u201d with the goal of working, not visiting as tourists.<\/p>\n

Lepere said she was told authorities were suspicious about their planned three-week stay in Hawaii because they had booked a hotel only for the first part of their visit. The pair, who had been traveling the world, had their mug shots taken, were denied entry and flew back to Tokyo.<\/p>\n

They found the mug shot episode so absurd, Lepere said, that they they were pictured smiling and almost laughing when they were photographed.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was just insane,\u201d Lepere said. \u201cWe couldn\u2019t comprehend it. They put us through metal detectors and our whole bodies were scanned. We had to stand naked in front of the police women and let them check us out.\u201d<\/p>\n

The German government on March 18 issued a travel advisory about the United States, warning on its website that U.S. border control agents have the final decision on entry even if travelers are holding valid visas, and added that even the slightest irregularity or infraction could result in detention.<\/p>\n

German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul called the treatment of German tourists at border controls \u201cunacceptable\u201d and said he would lodge protests with U.S. authorities.<\/p>\n

As for Br\u00f6sche, she said that as loath as she is to visit the United States again, she would not completely rule out the possibility of one day coming to Los Angeles.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can\u2019t forget about what happened but I can forgive \u2014 and if I could get to L.A. without any hassles at the border, I\u2019d love to see L.A.,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Kirschbaum is a special correspondent.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BERLIN\u00a0\u2014\u00a0Jessica Lia Br\u00f6sche is a Berlin tattoo artist who was escaping the frigid German winter in the sunshine…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":109237,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5311],"tags":[49748,557,3590,16254,49749,49752,49751,34470,10435,49753,1166,5465,49,978,659,49750,3118],"class_list":{"0":"post-109236","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-united-states","8":"tag-brosche","9":"tag-california","10":"tag-day","11":"tag-detention","12":"tag-german-tourist","13":"tag-germans","14":"tag-immigration-authority","15":"tag-los-angeles-times","16":"tag-march","17":"tag-maria-lepere","18":"tag-trump-administration","19":"tag-u-s-economy","20":"tag-united-states","21":"tag-us","22":"tag-usa","23":"tag-visitor","24":"tag-year"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114523664997245468","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109236","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=109236"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109236\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/109237"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=109236"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=109236"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=109236"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}