The United States is proposing a dramatic expansion of its border and customs regulations, a move critics argue is constructing a digital and bureaucratic wall around the nation. The new rules, developed under a January 2025 executive order from President Donald Trump, would impose unprecedented data collection requirements on millions of visitors.
A Modern-Day "Literacy Test" for Travelers?
Kelly McParland, writing for the National Post, draws a stark parallel between the proposed regulations and the infamous literacy tests used to disenfranchise Black voters in the American South prior to 1965. Those tests, like Alabama's 68-question exam on obscure constitutional knowledge, were designed with a specific outcome in mind: to exclude. While applied selectively, they gave officials wide discretionary power to achieve their goal.
The new U.S. travel framework, McParland suggests, employs a similar strategy of creating such a high barrier that it effectively keeps people out. The famous invitation from the Statue of Liberty seems distant, replaced by a prevailing attitude in Washington that conveys, "We don't want you, we don't need you, we'd really prefer you just go away."
The Staggering Scope of Proposed Data Demands
The core of the proposal targets the 42 countries currently part of the U.S. Visa Waiver Program (VWP), which includes close allies like the United Kingdom, France, Australia, and many European nations. Under the new rules, visitors from these countries would be forced to hand over a vast trove of personal information.
The requirements include:
- Five years' worth of social media data and handles.
- All telephone numbers used over the past five years.
- All email addresses used over the past decade.
- Extensive family data: names, addresses, phone numbers, and dates of birth for parents, spouses, siblings, and children.
- Biometric data, including facial images, fingerprints, iris scans, and potentially DNA.
- Any business contact information used in the past five to ten years.
Furthermore, the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) is piloting a "voluntary self-reported exit" program. This would ask departing visitors to provide passport data, a facial image, and their geolocation to officially prove they have left the country.
Broad Discretion and a Presidential Mandate
The proposed regulations are currently in a 60-day public comment period and have not yet taken effect. However, their origin in a presidential executive order means any significant reprieve would require a change of heart from President Trump himself. The order, issued in January 2025, directs a crackdown on criminals, terrorists, and drug dealers attempting to enter the United States.
The practical effect, analysts warn, could be a system where the decision to admit rests heavily on the discretion of individual border agents. With roughly 50,000 agents empowered at ports of entry, the criteria for refusal could become subjective and expansive, potentially barring not just identified threats but "just about anyone a responsible authority decides shouldn't be allowed in."
This approach mirrors recent U.S. policy shifts affecting Canadians, such as reports that permanent residents will face a new "visa integrity fee" and that some visitors could be denied entry based on medical conditions including obesity or a history of cancer.
The proposed rules represent a fundamental shift in the philosophy of border management for a nation built on immigration. By demanding a decade's worth of digital footprints and intimate family details as the price of entry, the United States risks replacing its image as a land of opportunity with that of a fortress, meticulously vetting the world from behind a wall of data.
