Thoughts on the Trump presidency

[Giugiaro]

I'm ashamed that Portugal wants to participate in both the FIFA World Cup and Eurovision. Shame doesn't exist anymore.

 

[ABB125]

Meanwhile, they're doing a great job of making the country less attractive to tourists...

BBC News - US could ask foreign tourists for five-year social media history before entry

US could ask tourists for five-year social media history before entry

The plan would affect people from countries, including the UK, who can fill out a form in lieu of a visa.

www.bbc.com

Tourists from dozens of countries including the UK could be asked to provide a five-year social media history as a condition of entry to the United States, under a new proposal unveiled by American officials.

 

[Welly]

^^
Doesn't bother me, I don't intend to visit USA for as long as Project 2025 is in full swing.

 

[m0ffy]

Not surprising from a regime that thinks the First Amendment only applies to right wing speech.

 

[pokemonsuper9]

Meanwhile, they're doing a great job of making the country less attractive to tourists...

BBC News - US could ask foreign tourists for five-year social media history before entry

US could ask tourists for five-year social media history before entry

The plan would affect people from countries, including the UK, who can fill out a form in lieu of a visa.

www.bbc.com

How do they expect to be provided that? Especially since some things could have been deleted.

 

[bleeder4]

Meanwhile, they're doing a great job of making the country less attractive to tourists...

BBC News - US could ask foreign tourists for five-year social media history before entry

US could ask tourists for five-year social media history before entry

The plan would affect people from countries, including the UK, who can fill out a form in lieu of a visa.

www.bbc.com

They've been doing it for a while. One of my colleagues got denied entry to the US in September about a 7 year old Tweet he made. Border control were asking everyone to unlock and hand over their phones during the passport check. When he handed over his phone the official opened the Twitter app and started scrolling back through the history. There was some post he had made around the time of Trump's first election win saying "Trump is such a douchebag" or something like that. Ever since then, whenever we have to send people over to the US we just get them a temporary phone on a 1 month contract and ask them to leave their main phone at home.

 

[ainsworth74]

How do they expect to be provided that? Especially since some things could have been deleted.

And of course at what level of detail? Do they want to know all your emails? Including work emails? What about shared emails? And what do they mean by Social Media? Facebook and Twitter obviously, but what about Reddit? Or even this Forum? It's crackers.

Not that it particularly impacts on me as I have no intention of travelling to the US until the political situation stabilises. Plenty of other places to explore even if it's a shame.

 

[gg1]

How do they expect to be provided that? Especially since some things could have been deleted.

And also what about people who don't or barely use social media.

I have a FB account but only for accessing groups, I've never posted anything on it. If I gave them that would they accept it or would they assume I was withholding my social media details from them and deny me access on that basis?

 

[pokemonsuper9]

And also what about people who don't or barely use social media.

Indeed, this is the most 'social' media I use.

 

[GusB]

I was torn between posting this here or in the Other News thread. Apparently the Calibri font is too woke!

Font of ‘wasteful’ diversity: Trump’s state department orders return to Times New Roman

Memo from Marco Rubio reportedly said cutting Calibri from official communication would ‘abolish yet another wasteful DEIA program’

www.theguardian.com

US diplomats have been ordered to return to using the Times New Roman typeface in official communications, with secretary of state Marco Rubio calling the Biden administration’s decision to adopt Calibri a “wasteful” diversity move, according to an internal department cable seen by Reuters.

The department under Rubio’s predecessor Antony Blinken switched to Calibri in 2023, claiming the modern sans-serif typeface was more accessible for people with disabilities because it did not have the decorative angular features and was the default in Microsoft products.

But a state department cable dated 9 December sent to all US diplomatic posts said that typography shapes the professionalism of an official document and Calibri is informal compared to serif typefaces.

“To restore decorum and professionalism to the Department’s written work products and abolish yet another wasteful DEIA program, the Department is returning to Times New Roman as its standard typeface,” the cable said.

“This formatting standard aligns with the President’s One Voice for America’s Foreign Relations directive, underscoring the Department’s responsibility to present a unified, professional voice in all communications,” it added.

The change to Calibri in 2023 was recommended by diversity and disability groups in the US government, according to US media reports. Some studies have suggested that sans-serif typefaces, such as Calibri, are easier to read for those with certain visual disabilities.

Comic Sans would probably be more fitting for this shower of idiots.

 

[Trainguy34]

Comic Sans would probably be more fitting for this shower of idiots.

Does it really matter, I'm not sure they have the capability to read more then basic sentences anyway!

 

[martin butler]

Sounds like the lunatics haven't just escaped the asylum, they are now running the country,

What a sad state of affairs, someone's so fragile that remarks that hurt their fragile ego, is now enough to refuse entry.

 

[Harpo]

Sounds like a long naughty list on here then!

 

[eastwestdivide]

Apparently the Calibri font is too woke!

Wouldn’t they prefer a nice fraktur font? Although that style fell out of favour with their role models around 1941 apparently.

 

[Gloster]

I wouldn’t be surprised if they treat people as guilty unless they can prove themselves innocent: if you can’t produce five years of innocent posts, you will be presumed to have written nasty things about the Great Helmsman and will be denied entry. I wonder if some companies are going to have to have a special set of ‘phones that will be filled with posts lauding the Don that will be issued to those travelling to the US. (This started off as one of my mad thoughts, but soon struck me as entirely reasonable in this bizarre world.)

How they are going to check through all the hundreds of messages about buying milk, where the car is parked or just who is going out with who at work, I do not know. Perhaps they will search for key words, so woe betide anyone who plays bridge, comes from Aberdeen or doesn’t like citrus fruit.

 

[TheSmiths82]

I will certainly be avoiding the USA, but as I don't like flying I had no plans to visit the place anyway. My concern is might be become wider spread in other parts of the world. I suspect the tourism industry in the USA will face dire consequences of this policy though.

 

[brad465]

If there was any doubt about Trump laying the groundwork for war in Venezuela:

US sanctions six more ships after seizing oil tanker off Venezuela - follow live

The Trump administration says the tanker was involved in “illicit oil shipping”, but Venezuela accuses the US of “theft” and “piracy”.

www.bbc.co.uk

US seizes tanker near Venezuela, Trump says​

​

The US has seized a tanker near Venezuela, Donald Trump says.

"As you probably know, we've just seized a tanker on the coast of Venezuela, a large one... the largest one ever seized actually... you'll be seeing that later and we'll be talking about it later with some other people," the president tells reporters during a White House event Wednesday afternoon.

We'll be bringing you live updates here – stay with us.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 10 Dec 2025 ==

In a further update, Trump's means of lowering inflation now appears to be blatant piracy:

US sanctions six more ships after seizing oil tanker off Venezuela - follow live

The Trump administration says the tanker was involved in “illicit oil shipping”, but Venezuela accuses the US of “theft” and “piracy”.

www.bbc.co.uk

Asked what will happen to the oil on the seized tanker, Trump says: "Well, we keep it, I guess."

"I assume we're going to keep the oil," he later adds.

Venezuela has some of the world's largest proven oil deposits and its president, Nicolás Maduro, has previously accused the US of trying to get its hands on the country's reserves.

 

[Bevan Price]

gg1 said:

And also what about people who don't or barely use social media.

Indeed, this is the most 'social' media I use.

Likewise. I have never used any of the traditional social media.
Even if I wanted to visit USA, I refuse to fly anywhere, and using ships (if available) would be too expensive for me.

 

[najaB]

Likewise. I have never used any of the traditional social media.

Nonsense. What are you talking about, everyone uses it. If you don't have a clear social media presence that is clear evidence that you're trying to hide something.

 

[jon0844]

I wouldn’t be surprised if they treat people as guilty unless they can prove themselves innocent: if you can’t produce five years of innocent posts, you will be presumed to have written nasty things about the Great Helmsman and will be denied entry. I wonder if some companies are going to have to have a special set of ‘phones that will be filled with posts lauding the Don that will be issued to those travelling to the US. (This started off as one of my mad thoughts, but soon struck me as entirely reasonable in this bizarre world.)

How they are going to check through all the hundreds of messages about buying milk, where the car is parked or just who is going out with who at work, I do not know. Perhaps they will search for key words, so woe betide anyone who plays bridge, comes from Aberdeen or doesn’t like citrus fruit.

I am sure they're going to be somewhat selective when it comes to enforcement, as I know a lot of people who will be in Las Vegas next month for the Consumer Electronics Show - and many of them have said some rather controversial things about Trump in their personal capacity, and some even in writing.

Now they'll either decide to let people in for the convention so as not to risk another publicity nightmare, or perhaps they'll turn a blind eye to those who might be more 'appealing' to the USA, if you know what I mean. Oh, okay, I mean they'll only focus on non-white people...

I expect they'll be using a tool that scans your posts once you give an email address or username. It will then determine a score based on whatever criteria they set. As most social media services are American, I wouldn't be surprised if Trump hasn't made sure that all the CEOs know they must share data (like who is who based on email address) or incur the wrath of an angry President.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 10 Dec 2025 ==

Nonsense. What are you talking about, everyone uses it. If you don't have a clear social media presence that is clear evidence that you're trying to hide something.

This. It will be very hard for you to convince them you don't use any social media. Plus I am sure forums are along the same lines, and they could just search for what you've said here instead.

I am sure you'd have to sign a declaration that you have no online presence at all, and would you risk lying? They might not be able to scan this forum and tie to a username that could be anything, but - again - are you going to lie if they implicitly ask?

Plus, as I said above, I wonder if they'll be fine if you are of a certain demographic and go to town if you're not.

Like others, I am not going to the USA anytime soon. And tourism has already taken a massive hit, to places like Las Vegas and Florida. And it isn't like it isn't cheaper than ever before to fly to some US states.. BA was doing New York with carry on bag AND suitcase for £230 return a couple of months back (source: Hot UK Deals).

They are still doing pretty cheap deals but some airlines appear to be cutting back some flights rather than run them with cheap seats to get them filled.

 

[Chrius56000]

They've been doing it for a while. One of my colleagues got denied entry to the US in September about a 7 year old Tweet he made. Border control were asking everyone to unlock and hand over their phones during the passport check. When he handed over his phone the official opened the Twitter app and started scrolling back through the history. There was some post he had made around the time of Trump's first election win saying "Trump is such a douchebag" or something like that. Ever since then, whenever we have to send people over to the US we just get them a temporary phone on a 1 month contract and ask them to leave their main phone at home.

. . .Would Trump and his border cronies be interested in innumerable Service Manuals of old Oscilloscopes and other 40 to 60 year old circuit diagrams of old British Test Equipment?!

. . That's all they'd find on my 'fone – I've never had Facebook, Twitter/X and all the other rubbish and my What's App is only electronics related messages to my good friend from Sutton Coldfield!

 

[Jimini]

It's a small sample (just me), granted, but I've been to and from the U.S for work eight times this year, and the only thing that's affected entry times was the government shutdown for a couple of those trips (lack of available staff / working to rule).

I've not seen / heard CBP staff looking at phones other than to check boarding passes to confirm where they've come from (you can normally hear the conversations from adjacent booths and / or the people in front of you in the lane queue).

If they vetted everyone's social media accounts upon arrival, the CBP system would simply be overwhelmed, and crush loading in the immigration halls would kick in pretty quickly.

 

[AlterEgo]

It's a small sample (just me), granted, but I've been to and from the U.S for work eight times this year, and the only thing that's affected entry times was the government shutdown for a couple of those trips (lack of available staff / working to rule).

I've not seen / heard CBP staff looking at phones other than to check boarding passes to confirm where they've come from (you can normally hear the conversations from adjacent booths and / or the people in front of you in the lane queue).

If they vetted everyone's social media accounts upon arrival, the CBP system would simply be overwhelmed, and crush loading in the immigration halls would kick in pretty quickly.

The idea is that this is going to happen when applying for an ESTA, not something which is done on arrival.

 

[Jimini]

The idea is that this is going to happen when applying for an ESTA, not something which is done on arrival.

Fair point — how do you check someone’s social media footprint virtually though? Genuine question.

 

[AndyPJG]

Nonsense. What are you talking about, everyone uses it. If you don't have a clear social media presence that is clear evidence that you're trying to hide something.

Not nonsense.Not everyone. I Don't Have a mobile phone, this forum is probably the nearest to social media foe me.

 

[styles]

Fair point — how do you check someone’s social media footprint virtually though? Genuine question.

If I remember rightly from the last few times I've done ESTA, there are already fields there for social media handles. I've just never filled them in because they're optional. Perhaps they'll change the form slightly to require either a handle or a box to tick to say you don't use that social media site.

Of course for something like Facebook or X, if your account is set to private, I'm not sure them having your handle will help much, unless they're really going to go through the effort of applying some sort of law enforcement order on the social media companies to hand over your posts for visa/ESTA purposes. I'm not clued up enough on US law to know if that's an existing power or if it would require new legislation.

 

[jon0844]

From: https://www.federalregister.gov/doc...on-arrival-and-departure-record-form-i-94-and

3. Mandatory Social Media:

In order to comply with the January 2025 Executive Order 14161 (Protecting the United States From Foreign Terrorists and Other National Security and Public Safety Threats), CBP is adding social media as a mandatory data element for an ESTA application. The data element will require ESTA applicants to provide their social media from the last 5 years.

4. High Value Data Elements:

To comply with the January 2025 E.O. (14161), and the April 4, 2025, Memorandum Updating All Forms to Collect Baseline Biographic Data, CBP will add several “high value data fields” to the ESTA application, when feasible. This is in addition to the information already collected in the ESTA application.

The high value data fields include:

a. Telephone numbers used in the last five years;

b. Email addresses used in the last ten years;

c. IP addresses and metadata from electronically submitted photos;

d. Family member names (parents, spouse, siblings, children);

e. Family number telephone numbers used in the last five years;

f. Family member dates of birth;

g. Family member places of birth;

h. Family member residencies;

i. Biometrics—face, fingerprint, DNA, and iris;

j. Business telephone numbers used in the last five years;

k. Business email addresses used in the last ten years.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 11 Dec 2025 ==

If I remember rightly from the last few times I've done ESTA, there are already fields there for social media handles. I've just never filled them in because they're optional. Perhaps they'll change the form slightly to require either a handle or a box to tick to say you don't use that social media site.

Of course for something like Facebook or X, if your account is set to private, I'm not sure them having your handle will help much, unless they're really going to go through the effort of applying some sort of law enforcement order on the social media companies to hand over your posts for visa/ESTA purposes. I'm not clued up enough on US law to know if that's an existing power or if it would require new legislation.

They're going to be compulsory questions from next year, plus does Donald Trump need to change any laws when he does what he wants?

Your account being private means nothing as they'll be almost certainly using your email address/user name to do searches that aren't just seeing what you do or don't make visible. I'd be shocked if Facebook hasn't agreed to share all your personal data with the US Government for the purposes of crime prevention. Who cares what the law says? Will the Supreme Court do anything about it?

 

[martin butler]

Is it just me, But isn't it strange how a certain list, of a certain financier, and best buddy of Trump at one time seems to have gone very quiet,

Why, it's almost as if it's all been engineered to keep stories that Trump might find problematic, off the front pages and off the media channels,

 

[ABB125]

High Value Data Elements:

To comply with the January 2025 E.O. (14161), and the April 4, 2025, Memorandum Updating All Forms to Collect Baseline Biographic Data, CBP will add several “high value data fields” to the ESTA application, when feasible. This is in addition to the information already collected in the ESTA application.

The high value data fields include:

a. Telephone numbers used in the last five years;

b. Email addresses used in the last ten years;

c. IP addresses and metadata from electronically submitted photos;

d. Family member names (parents, spouse, siblings, children);

e. Family number telephone numbers used in the last five years;

f. Family member dates of birth;

g. Family member places of birth;

h. Family member residencies;

i. Biometrics—face, fingerprint, DNA, and iris;

j. Business telephone numbers used in the last five years;

k. Business email addresses used in the last ten years.

Noting that it says "where feasible"...

How are you going to provide a DNA sample during the ESTA application process?!

 

[gg1]

Nonsense. What are you talking about, everyone uses it. If you don't have a clear social media presence that is clear evidence that you're trying to hide something.

Not nonsense.Not everyone. I Don't Have a mobile phone, this forum is probably the nearest to social media foe me.

I read that as a facetious comment intended to convey the attitudes held by the people in the US government behind this ridiculous idea, not @najaB's own views. I hope that was the intent anyway.