Afternoon y’all.
My company is trying to get me to go to the US to train some folks in our department, the problem is I don’t trust the US border agency whatsoever especially when it comes to my digital devices.
My boss crosses weekly so it makes me think there won’t be an issue however, I really don’t want to take the chance of being searched.
What’s been your recent experience crossing the border?
Edit: I should note that I haven’t left my province in about 15 years so this is all new to me.
Edit 2: Thank you all for the responses, I spoke with a majority of my co-workers and HR and for the most part everyone agrees that the Americans should come up to Canada or we train someone who is comfortable entering the US.
My HR department is going to speak with my boss hopefully sorts out a plan that works with everyone.
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100% serious
I’m Métis, on the darker side, but mostly pass as white-enough. My mum and step-dad took us to meet his family in Indiana summer of 2002. We got picked for “random security checks” every leg of the journey, we were quite poor…so we had to make 4 transfers in the US. I’ve been back to the US a lot since then, I have family and friends down the way. Every time I went I get extra attention from TSA or border authority.
Just to put this into context, I now live in Scotland, you know…where they make white people. And not one single person I’ve interacted with thinks I’m not white. I was in London during the lockdowns, and had a shocking moment of realisation when an afro-brit aunty who was drunk and getting right close in line got a bit aggressive when I asked her politely to give me a bit of space.
She said to me:You fucking white people!
And I was like…holy shit…of course the context from home isn’t the context here…I’m not seen as anything but another white guy. It legitimately fucked my head for a week…
I recommend against it. Not for your sake so much as we americans deserve to be in time out while we work through some shit.
It is not safe to do. Please don’t visit the US.
While your boss may feel safe crossing the boarder you can tell your boss you do not feel safe crossing the boarder, your safety comes first. Under the Canadian Charter of Human Rights and the Labour Board of Canada (I am almost certain I am getting that agency’s name wrong) an employer cannot ask you to do something that you do not feel safe doing when there is risk to your life and safety. It may not statistically hurt you, but there is a non-0% chance that you will not be locked up in jail in the US or disappeared to Al Salvador.
Yes there is a non-0% chance of that you just get picked up and arrested for some BS thing in Canada, but there has yet to be a case of a person disappeared in the past couple of years by the government.
If you are being asked to leave the country for work I am guessing you have some seniority in your company, but you have not even left the province for the past 15 years leads me to believe that those with more seniority have all turned down the opportunity to gamble with a free trip to Al Salvador.
If you do go to the US for work remember to always have your passport on you.
One possible solution for computers is to have your company IT set up a laptop in the US and let you remote in and complete the set up, so you don’t have to bring your laptop across the border.
For the phone, if it’s short enough, you can bring a company phone with none of your personal stuff there and auto forward your personal phone to the company phone. That would mean you won’t have access to your personal phone for the duration.
Some communication tools allow connections to a computer, so if your company lets you set up a laptop remotely like above, you can try connecting them to the laptop, some allow remote pairing, others require the phone to be on the same network and may not work. I think WhatsApp and Facebook have a windows app and browser app. Signal also have a windows app.Regardless of people’s average experience I’m gonna say : Don’t bring electronics you don’t want searched. https://www.cbp.gov/travel/cbp-search-authority/border-search-electronic-devices
I would personally refuse to go. But that’s not always feasible depending on your job and relationship with your company.
I would at minimum not bring any personal electronics. The border agent may demand your device, unlocked, so they can disappear into a back room for a few minutes before returning it to you. Assume all your credentials stored on the device will have copied and that the US Federal government now has access to your everything. You can refuse but you’ll be turned away from crossing, possibly detained, and probably barred from future entries for life.
I hate to say it, but if you’re white you’ll probably have an uneventful crossing. But there’s absolutely no guarantee of that.
Border agents also get especially cagey if you’re travelling to work. They seem to interpret the word “business” as meaning you’re going to overstay your visa and try to work illegally. I had an incredibly complicated conversation at a crossing a decade ago because the agent didn’t seem to know what a TRADE SHOW was and gave me the third degree.
I have some family that’s been travelling as tourists or with green cards and they reported zero issues with them or people travelling around them.
How white are you? Visibly trans or could be mistaken as trans? Ever post anything critical of Cheeto Benito, or in support of someone like Luigi on Facebook?
I recently crossed by car. It was no different from pre-Trump crossings: a few pro forma questions, they looked in the trunk, and then waved us through.
I was expecting them to demand my phone or be difficult. That wasn’t the case.
American in the Detroit area. Just be polite but curt.
Provide your residency document.
Simply state your reason for travel without any unnecessary details.
The answer to bringing anything notable into the country is no.
