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'Foreign Tech Workers Are Avoiding Travel To the US' (computerworld.com) 224

In an opinion piece for Computerworld, columnist Steven Vaughan-Nichols argues that restrictive visa policies and a hostile border climate under the Trump administration are driving foreign tech workers, researchers, and conference speakers away from the U.S. The result, he says, is a gradual shift of talent, events, and long-term innovation toward more welcoming regions such as Europe, Canada, and Asia. From the report: I go to a lot of tech conferences -- 13 in 2025 -- and many of those I attend are outside the U.S.; several are in London, one is in Amsterdam, another in Paris, and two in Tokyo. Wherever I went this past year, when we weren't talking about AI, Linux, the cloud, or open-source software, the top non-tech topic for non-Americans involved the sweeping changes that have occurred since President Donald J. Trump returned to office last January. The conversations generally ended with something like this: "I'm not taking a job or going to a conference in the United States."

Honestly, who can blame them? Under Trump, America now has large "Keep Out!" and "No Trespassing!" signs effectively posted. I've known several top tech people who tried to come to the U.S. for technology shows with proper visas and paperwork, but were still turned away at the border. Who wants to fly for 8+ hours for a conference, only to be refused entry at the last minute, and be forced to fly back? I know many of the leading trade show organizers, and it's not just me who's seeing this. They universally agree that getting people from outside the States to agree to come to the U.S. is increasingly difficult. Many refuse even to try to come. As a result, show managers have begun to close U.S.-based events and are seeking to replace them with shows in Europe, Canada, and Asia. [...]

Once upon a time, everyone who was anyone in tech was willing to uproot their lives to come to the U.S. Here, they could make a good living. They could collaborate, publish, and build companies in jurisdictions that welcome them, and meet their peers at conferences. Now, they must run a gauntlet at the U.S. border and neither a green card nor U.S. citizenship guarantees they won't be abused by the federal government. Trump's America seems bound and determined to become a second-rate tech power. His administration can loosen all the restrictions it wants on AI, but without top global talent, U.S. tech prowess will decline. That's not good for America, the tech industry or the larger world.

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'Foreign Tech Workers Are Avoiding Travel To the US'

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  • by ozmartian ( 5754788 ) on Tuesday December 30, 2025 @10:07PM (#65891709) Homepage
    Right wing propoganda is a helluva drug...
    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      In their minds we are winning. This is exactly what they voted for.

      • by postbigbang ( 761081 ) on Tuesday December 30, 2025 @11:20PM (#65891813)

        And tech titans don't need to go to conferences, except to keynote at their own vanity-bro love fests held in achingly expensive venues.

        The sheer volume of rah-rah overcomes any sanity, and the "business partners" all tote the company line. They remind me of political conventions, except the food might be better.

        • Then why do those same tech titans keep sponsoring every conference I go to...?

          Are you under the impression that they only sell technology they developed in-house or something?

        • Precisely. These days, nobody needs visas and expensive air tickets: video conferencing is a lot more reliable than even a decade ago. They just get on Zoom or Google Meet or MS Teams, and do their presentations.
      • by Z00L00K ( 682162 ) on Wednesday December 31, 2025 @02:30AM (#65891989) Homepage Journal

        The risk of being rejected, imprisoned and questioned due to posts on (a)social media or contents in your electronic devices is too high.

        "I see that you liked a post of Trump as Big Brother - that'll earn you three months in prison"

        • by sg_oneill ( 159032 ) on Wednesday December 31, 2025 @02:58AM (#65892005)

          Yeah, we're looking at pulling our manufacturing out of the US because its just too much bullshit and risk right now. Add that to the tariffs making the US about the most expensive place to manufacture on the planet right now, our international staff getting monstered at the airports and the fact that the economy seems to be an absolute basket case at the moment, yeah the risks are too high. And thats not even touching on the fact that we cant bring commercial-in-confidence information into the country because ICE keep fucking with peoples computers, its just a hostile environment for business.

      • In their minds we are winning. This is exactly what they voted for.

        Similar is happening in the UK and we don't even (yet) have a nutty government, only an incompetent one without a plan.

        The NHS has relied on foreign born doctors, 42% of all doctors were born outside the UK. While there was a surge in recruitment after Brexit but that has now slowed.

        Doctors in the NHS are well paid when compared to the UK population as a whole but not well paid when compared to doctors in other countries. Australia and the U

    • by gweihir ( 88907 ) on Wednesday December 31, 2025 @01:33AM (#65891941)

      They think they are winning and winning big.

      That the opposite is happening is beyond their non-existent capabilities to fact-check. Kind of reminds me of the COVID-deniers that were in the last stages of dying from it but still claiming it was not real. The mental capabilities of average people are atrociously bad, with the exception of really good skills at delusion.

      • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

        by mjwx ( 966435 )

        They think they are winning and winning big.

        That the opposite is happening is beyond their non-existent capabilities to fact-check. Kind of reminds me of the COVID-deniers that were in the last stages of dying from it but still claiming it was not real. The mental capabilities of average people are atrociously bad, with the exception of really good skills at delusion.

        Speaking of COVID conspiracy nuts... weren't we all meant to be dead now from vaccine hurties by now? Or is this something that keeps being pushed back like the Rapture.

        They said we'd be in perpetual lockdowns... these were the first things to go.
        They said we'd have to show vaccine passports everywhere for life... these never had more than a token effort before being forgotten.
        They said it would just go away... It got worse before we developed a vaccine.

        On that last point, it's still killing antivax

        • by gweihir ( 88907 )

          Is there anything these nutters got right?

          I can think of one thing: They dialed the stupid high enough to keep going, but low enough to not wipe themselves out. That is probably just random dumb luck though.

  • No kidding... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by dskoll ( 99328 ) on Tuesday December 30, 2025 @10:13PM (#65891715) Homepage

    I certainly wouldn't feel safe setting foot in the US. And I definitely don't feel welcomed.

    But hey, it's good for Canada. We've already poached quite a few top-talent academics from the US and I suspect more will come.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      The USA wasn't too welcoming even before the unsolicited-finger-in-your-ass service known as TSA was established back after the 9/11 Dubbya security fiasco. Now that it is a self-certified banana republic run by a demented lunatic with delusions of grandeur, which the world is starting to successfully route around, there's absolutely no reason to set foot there.

    • Re:No kidding... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by tlhIngan ( 30335 ) <slashdot.worf@net> on Wednesday December 31, 2025 @01:52AM (#65891959)

      I certainly wouldn't feel safe setting foot in the US. And I definitely don't feel welcomed.

      But hey, it's good for Canada. We've already poached quite a few top-talent academics from the US and I suspect more will come.

      I think the biggest thing to watch for would be CES. Many companies from around the world fly in to show their wares there. It's basically only Las Vegas that could host it given how big it is, and it's booked years in advance. It would be interesting to see how empty it becomes and if they have to reduce the size because fewer people can exhibit, show and attend.

      Also, I think many of the bigger shows will start moving outside the US just to pick up the international crowd.

      This is horrendously bad for the US, because if the international attendees go to the non-US exhibition, US exhibitors will start to go there as well, and soon it will become established - why have the US convention when everyone is just going to to the non-US one again anyways?

      Eventually the international locations will be where the event happens and convention cities like Las Vegas would lose out. I suppose they could always invite the physicists back (they were banned because they didn't gamble).

      The problem is habit forming - it doesn't take long to form new traditions and now you've lost your crowd for good.

      Watch things like CES, then watch what happens to conventions that have a huge international component to them like BlackHat for DefCon which may have to split up.

      • Absolutely and Vegas is already suffering after COVID and a ton of self inflicted wounds from the resorts companies. A shrinking CES does not bode well.

        At the same time that's the political divide in a nutshell. Trump turned NV 51-48. Clark county where Vegas is and is like 60% of the votes went to Harris 50-48 but all but one other county sparse as they are went red by like 70+. Will the decline of the tourism industry affect whatever happens in central Nevada?

        Far too late to avoid a lot of negative c

      • by ukoda ( 537183 )
        As I post further down I cancelled my plans to go to CES in 2025 basically because it felt too high risk for the return. The thing about CES is it is an expensive exercise so the money lost for each foreign CES tourist is probably more that the money lost from an average tourist. Money aside the non-attendance is also a reflection of the loss of status and reputation that the USA once held.
    • by jrnvk ( 4197967 )

      But hey, it's good for Canada. We've already poached quite a few top-talent academics from the US and I suspect more will come.

      Considering Canada still has a ban on foreigners buying houses, much higher taxes (and prices in general) than the US, and increasingly overcrowded health care system - I think that wish coming true is very unlikely.

      • by dskoll ( 99328 )

        There is no Canadian ban on foreigners buying houses if the foreigners have a right to live in Canada and plan on living in the houses.

        Taxes in Canada are higher than the US... though by the time you add in medical insurance premiums, the difference is much less. And corporate taxes in Canada are not much higher than in the US at all. (I ran a company in Canada for 19 years, and not having to pay expensive health insurance for employees gave us a big competitive advantage over US companies.)

        Our health

    • by mjwx ( 966435 )

      I certainly wouldn't feel safe setting foot in the US. And I definitely don't feel welcomed.

      But hey, it's good for Canada. We've already poached quite a few top-talent academics from the US and I suspect more will come.

      This is something that concerns me in the UK... at some point the tipping point is going to be reached and Skilled Americans will start looking for work outside the US with in increasing numbers with increasing desperation as employment opportunities dry up stateside. We could be looking at a refugee crisis from a former 1st world country if Trump goes on too long.

  • by test321 ( 8891681 ) on Tuesday December 30, 2025 @10:31PM (#65891745)

    I travelled to conferences in the US early 2000s. I had to fill that paper saying I'm not a Communist so I can enter the country. "First they came for the Communists, and I said nothing, because I am not a Communist." But now my news say that from February 2026, visitors will be asked to provide social media login to check the posts, list of phone numbers used in the past 5 years, list of email addresses. And that's simply no, and absolute and definitive no, whatever the reason for the travel.

    • The stasi were at least discrete about this type of thing.

    • by gweihir ( 88907 )

      Yep. Some of it was bad even back then. Some people that invited me even got me an official invitation letter from the DHS because they feared I might have problems otherwise. But these days? It is like they throw a dice on whether to let you in or not.

    • I get some of this. But people who have visited before and caused no problems and say retired. it should be about risk management. There should be certainty before arrival. Tourists bring in money and jobs. Some say these new rules are hurting the genuine tourist biz. Better to remove guesswork out out the equation.
      • ..it should be about risk management. There should be certainty before arrivalBetter to remove guesswork out out the equation.

        Gee, if only America took this common sense advice for the last five years instead of hiring an Open Border Czar who ensured the border stayed open by never visiting it.

        It’s as if we simply cannot imagine how we got here. Oh wait. I almost forgot. We don’t have to imagine. At all.

        Troll tags, don’t change Truth.

    • by ukoda ( 537183 )
      You are not alone in that view. The social media thing is a hard no for me too. Who knows WTF will trigger them? They could interpret a recipe for chocolate cake as coded call for Antifa violence? Then again you don't need to interpret my views on their POTUS, whom I have called an asshole and a moron etc. As I understand things currently free speech in the USA doesn't apply if are giving an honest option of their dear leader.
  • by ukoda ( 537183 ) on Tuesday December 30, 2025 @10:39PM (#65891761) Homepage
    I had been planning to go to CES in 2025 and catch up with people I had worked with in the US in the past. However even back in late 2024 I didn't like the vibes coming out of the USA, so went to Japan instead. In hindsight the best travel decision I made recently. I wonder if I will ever visit the USA again, certainly not at my own expense, and I would probably need a really good reason.
  • The result, he says, is a gradual shift of talent, events, and long-term innovation toward more welcoming regions such as Europe, Canada, and Asia

    "Are we finding out yet?"

  • None of my friends have interest in going to America, for at least three years or less ( on the day it finally happens! )

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by sabbede ( 2678435 )
      Which means what? That your peer group overweights partisan politics when looking at vacation destinations? That they can't compartmentalize and as a result let politics infest and thus ruin their normal daily lives?

      Or are you just saying, "we're so far to the left that we won't even visit a center-right nation"?
      Oh, I can predict a response here so let me add, "so far to the left that we can't even recognize where the center or center-right are. Even center-left looks 'fascist'' to us."

      Or, am I be

  • Trump hands over political power to all these 'tech lords', and the outcome is actual tech people are avoiding the country.

  • by gwolf ( 26339 ) <gwolf@@@gwolf...org> on Wednesday December 31, 2025 @02:04AM (#65891973) Homepage

    I am Mexican. Oh, but I do "look European", and have traveled all over the world, and have a quite good level of English, and hold a PhD, and have a good job with 20+ years of stability, and what not. I have been several times to the USA, to cities all over the map. And I have a valid USA visa. I know that I would have no problem visiting. Still, no way.
    I got my visa (and used it, years ago) because there's always an interesting conference that happens there. There is also a good chance of finding good flights elsewhere that has a layover in the USA.
    But no, for several years, I have decided I am not setting foot there. Who needs to go to the USA, frankly? Even interesting tech and academic conferences are leaving the USA, so I'm not missing out so much by sticking to countries whose politicians don't promise to make me feel unwelcome. ... ...And I'm sure all this hatred and isolationism will come back and bite them. In many aspects, the USA has ceded terrain to other world powers (mostly China), and is no longer #1 for innovation, science or computing.

    • China is full of crap. Stop believing the propaganda. We're not isolationist, we want other countries to contribute to supporting the global status quo.

  • As beautiful as the US is, the next time I fly over the Atlantic, it will most likely be to visited Canada instead, unless the US government *really* makes a serious effort to be much more welcoming to European tourists than it is now.

  • I considered moving there in the 90s. I worked at bell labs at the time, partially in Europe, partially in the US (Massachusets).
    It looked attractive back then, but already "risky", (I had a wife and 2 very small kids, and heard of issues with health insurance from colleagues).

    Then we considered Canada, which shared some of the risk, but less of the benefits (low taxes, high standard of living). I visited it looking for work and finding out how live there would be, and I found it totally dissapointing.

    Inste

  • Entering the USA was always a kind of a humiliating process, with multiple know-nothings underway with the power to deny you the entry for no reason whatsoever. And yet, I went through the process three times already, once for business, two times as a tourist, trusting that it won't be THAT bad after all, and that the most of it is just a show. I trusted the law and order in the country, and was not disappointed in the past. Nowadays it all became much more volatile and uncertain: even though I *think* I "have nothing to hide", can I be certain, that at some point in time, I didn't like a cat video by a person who turned out to be a second-removed cousin of an "left wing extremist antifa" (heh, as if you people knew what left wing extremist even means)? Or that I didn't repost a JD meme at some point? Or that my name is not merely the same as the name of some blacklisted shmock? Why should I even take the risk of being denied the entry or even put under arrest or sent to El Salvador? The benefit of entering the USA is by far not as huge as some seem to think it is. So no, I'm definitely not giving anybody my "last 5 years of all social media accounts"... to be honest, I probably don't even know which one I have created at some point in time, just to use it once-twice and never again. You have pushed it way too far, the hurdles are just not acceptable any more. We understand, we are not desired - fine with me, I'll spend my time and money some place else.
    • by DrXym ( 126579 )
      It's even more humiliating every time ESTA changes. These days they merely want to know everything about visitors before they arrive - occupation, family history, social media, photograph etc. The poor bastards not eligible for ESTA probably have to show up at an embassy for a grilling. The reasons for this have transformed from merely homeland security into political vetting. A meme or comment someone might have made about Trump in the past could destroy a trip over. Not to mention people who've seen visas
      • Haha, right - the first time my wife and me went over to USA, our country was not yet within ESTA (or ESTA didn't yet exist, not sure). In any case, we had to go to the embassy for the "grilling". The "grilling" was then kind of OK, you still feel like a shit that needs to persuade the all-powerful underpaid government employe that you are worthy of entering the holy land of the USA, but we were used to bureaucracy. The waiting time was excessive though, we spent the entire afternoon waiting, despite having
  • by DrXym ( 126579 ) on Wednesday December 31, 2025 @06:29AM (#65892239)
    The talent goes where the opportunities and money are. If a country makes the foreign talent unwelcome they'll go somewhere else. I could even see many US engineers & scientists deciding to decamp to Europe, Canada or elsewhere if they think the opportunities are better.
  • by jopet ( 538074 ) on Wednesday December 31, 2025 @09:57AM (#65892491) Journal

    *People* are avoiding travel to the US.

    Noone wants to visit a country that has that kind of idiocracy going on and being supported by half of the voters.

  • It's going to take ten years to fix the mess Biden made in four. The current judicial habit of letting the felons go early if they were incarcerated at all isn't helping.

    One example, note the article is sanitized to avoid mentioning race and prior convictions. The news media is complicit in the problem.

    "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oqZyz-Hr0Rk"

    Fale Pea, 42, is charged with first-degree assault, which includes a deadly weapon enhancement. Pea was armed with a wooden board that had a screw through one end

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