Tag Archives for immigration.
A woman crossing the U.S. border from Mexico was detained by Customs and Border Protection after facial recognition software repeatedly failed to match her current appearance to her passport photo taken 10 years earlier. Officers claimed her eyes looked “more open” in her old picture, leaving her locked in a secure room and repeatedly questioned before finally being allowed to leave without explanation.
Minneapolis has refused to renew liquor licenses for two hotels accused of housing ICE agents, igniting a political and legal controversy. Despite warnings from the city’s own attorney about potential illegality, the city council moved forward—highlighting deep tensions around immigration enforcement and local government intervention.
ICE is using a smartphone app called “Mobile Fortify” to scan faces and capture contactless fingerprints, instantly pulling back names and biographical data — and court filings say the same encounters are being followed by revocations of Global Entry and TSA PreCheck.
That turns “trusted traveler” into chilling of speech. DHS runs both the surveillance and the program, and being “under investigation” can be enough to lose your status even if protesting itself cannot legally be a disqualifier.
A Minneapolis airport employee says ICE agents will be “checking and verifying documents” for the next three weeks, including patrolling jet bridges at the gates. It’s a post-security choke point that makes it easy to intercept travelers right before boarding or immediately after landing—and it raises serious questions about how this overlaps with the right to travel, especially for citizens and lawful residents who can still get caught up in enforcement mistakes.
fter her Global Entry was suddenly revoked, a woman says the government “erased” her — because when she tried to renew her U.S. passport online, the system allegedly returned a message saying no record of her identity could be found. Her congressional office is now trying to get answers.
Hilton says it is removing a Minneapolis-area hotel from the brand after a follow-up video suggested the property was still refusing to honor Department of Homeland Security bookings even after an apology and assurances that agents would be welcome.
DHS is accusing Hilton-branded hotels in the Minneapolis area of canceling government-rate reservations and refusing to house immigration personnel, citing a “no ICE” email from a Hampton Inn franchise while activist pressure like “No Sleep for ICE” protests provides a motive for the cnacels.
Bali’s governor is pushing a “quality tourism” plan that would require visitors to show three months of bank statements before being allowed to enter. There may be no fixed minimum balance—just officials judging whether your finances fit your itinerary—which is exactly why I wouldn’t visit if this becomes policy: it invites arbitrary enforcement and turns private financial data into a security risk.
CBP detained a school superintendant for hours at Houston’s airport after a trip to Nicaragua, and he says agents told him he had no Fourth Amendment rights while pressuring him for passwords and devices. Now the U.S. citizen is suing DHS to curb border phone searches and challenge the government’s suspicionless device search rules.
TSA is sending ICE airline passenger lists multiple times a week, running everyone who flies through an immigration-enforcement match using the Secure Flight pipeline that was built for aviation security. It turns airports into chokepoints for law enforcement: broad roster surveillance first, detain-and-sort-out-later in the terminal, and a structure that invites mission creep beyond immigration.
Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel -- a topic he has covered since 2002.
Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »
