Yesterday, I was held for two hours (not detained, we will get into that later) by CBP, under suspicion that my political party (Pirate Party) in Canada might be a violent extremist organization. When they gave me the keys to my car I was in such a hurry to get back home, that I forgot to get anyones names so I could send a card directly so instead I will have to just write an open letter, and hope it gets to the right people.
Dear Buffalo Border Patrol (@CBPBuffalo),
Hey guys, you may or may not remember me but as frequently as you hold me, I would be surprised if you didn’t. I am the guy who drives the car that one of your officers described as “gay”, which I assume he meant “fabulous” so I appreciate the compliment.
I am also the guy yesterday who you accused of being a terrorist.
I am getting ahead of myself though, now that you remember me I wanted to make a few apologies:
Sorry For Telling Stupid Jokes At The Initial Crossing
I come through the border a lot, and I always arrive with a smile ask how the officer is doing, and promptly hand over my keys when asked. This time, I thought I would try breaking the ice with a joke, so when handing over my keys I suggested “you guys keep searching my car and finding nothing, but have you considered that I might just be smuggling Fiats?”, to which you just stared at me.
I am not good at reading body language, so I figure you were just laughing on the inside but I was unable to see it in your eyes. Incase my joke offended you or made you think I was really smuggling Fiats – I am sorry. In hindsight the joke wasn’t all that funny, and perhaps next time I will come up with something better.
Sorry That I Was Unable To Answer Questions
I didn’t want to be rude, I know that if you came to my house I would expect that you would answer basic questions that I would ask of you — nothing too personal or anything, just “tell me more about your political beliefs” and “is your political party a violent extremist organization”, just friendly conversation because “I am interested in the party personally, and just want to know more”. You expected me to be more forthcoming, and when I rudely didn’t answer your questions I could see you were getting upset at me.
I also should have been paying better attention to both officers who were asking me questions. When one told me he was done with me and that I should go sit back down, I should have known that by going to sit back down I would be acting suspicious to the second one who didn’t tell me to go anywhere.
I should point out that when I did answer questions, they always just lead to more questions and more questions. When I didn’t answer any questions I was able to go sit down, so I thought you were trying to subtly tell me you wanted less information. Again, I am not good at reading people so I am sorry for that.
Sorry I Thought I Could Leave When You Said “You Are Not Being Detained”
When I asked you “am I being detained?” and you said “no”, I figured that I was free to leave. After all, my interpretation of the law is that I am either being detained or arrested, or that I am free to leave. This must be my own ignorance, because as I walked towards the door you told me if I took another step that I would be in handcuffs. Yikes.
I wasn’t trying to cause a scene, though I am sure it looked that way. I just temporarily forgot that it is your belief that within border crossing, you have supreme law which supersedes all other civil liberties. My mistake.
Sorry About Offending You
When I was being questioned you asked if I was recording anything from my car and I told you that I was (because there was no sign outside anywhere which said I couldn’t).
When I suggested that if you were doing nothing wrong, what did you have to hide… you got angry at me. You seemed to think that it was interfering with your search of my vehicle which is illegal. The last thing I want to do is interfere. The only reason I responded with that line, is that you have used it so frequently on me and I have heard it so often in the news… I thought it was an appropriate question to ask.
Sorry That I Started Coughing Uncontrollably
Remember that time when I was in my seat, coughing uncontrollably and you guys were just looking at me over the counter? Classic. Happens when I don’t have my inhaler. Luckily for me, I don’t have asthma just a really bad case of bronchitis, and after 5 minutes of hacking my lungs up in your detention secondary screening that I cannot leave from room, you asked if I was having a medical emergency…
You then took me out to my car to grab my inhaler, so obviously your officers deserve a big thank you for being concerned that I might die under their watch. To further this, later you asked me what narcotics I was on, and not if I was on any, so I am guessing you figured I was just smoking pot in the detention secondary screening area.
Sorry My Car Was A Mess
I have been searched crossing into the US every time I come through over the past 3 months, this totals over 8 inspections. I decided to leave the floorboard detaached from my trunk, since I figured you removed it last time — you might want to have easy access in the future.
Yesterday, however, my car was a mess — normally I like to keep my car super clean and sexy. Today I felt like you might be judging me. If you did judge me, I deserved it… it probably looked like a 12 year old’s room 3 days after Christmas.
Though you must have interpreted my messy car as some sort of weapon of mass destruction, because after searching it you accused me of being a terrorist. Next time, I will try to clean my car a little more.
Sorry You Mistook Me For A Terrorist
I will be honest, I have respect for what you think you are doing: protecting freedom. We might disagree on your effectiveness from time to time, but it’s the thought that counts, right? I was, however, surprised when you suggested I was a terrorist.
For starters, the fact that I and my girlfriend were the only two white people in holding for the two hours we were there makes me proud of your department for showing progressive values and applying affirmative action to your secondary searches. Even though ~75% of the population of America is white, we were equally represented (maybe even under represented) in comparison to hispanic and middle eastern / east asian people. While basically all of your officers were white males (some white females), the fact that you balance that out by detaining more minorities makes up for it.
I know that my car is messy, and that my political affiliation, being a prime concern of all border agents, does say “Pirate Party” and just like Al-Quida means “Terrorist Party” in arabic, you would be concerned that a criminal organization would just put their dastardly deeds right in the title of their organization. Perhaps we should be something less suspicious like “The Base Party”.
One of your agents came up to me, and said that he didn’t want to violate my civil liberties and that if he could get a little cooperation it would be great because otherwise he has all this paperwork he has to fill out, and he has other parts of his job he enjoys way more than paperwork. Please make sure that he gets my apologies, I didn’t think to ask him what he prefers doing… I was being selfish and thinking only about myself.
Immediately after that the officer asked what my dads name is, what my moms name is, what her citizenship status was in America — and because I know he hated paperwork, I tried to be nice and cooperate. However, he then asked me again if my political party had any radical elements to it. I refused to answer the question and he got angry. I do hate making people angry and perhaps in different circumstances we could be friends, please ensure he knows he has an open invitation to have a beer with me.
I just had this strange urge to shut down every time it was suggested that I was a terrorist. It’s not you, it’s me. Clearly that is an abnormal reaction to the suggestion.
When you suggested if I don’t answer your questions that you would call the FBI, I actually got really excited. I have always thought the FBI looked really cool. As a guy who watches White Collar all the time, I was ready to have our conversation and didn’t mean to offend you when I encouraged you to call them. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to talk to you anymore, just to live out my fantasy of an FBI interrogation.
Sorry That I Am Not A Terrorist
I was let down when after all the threats that you made about what you could do to me: lock me up, call the FBI, etc — after two hours you just gave me my keys and said I could go. I had even tucked in my shirt and gave my girlfriend her credit card that I was holding onto, just in case I was taken into custody and she wasn’t.
I will be sure to release my audio recordings, as I always do. That way everyone can see what an amazing job you are doing. Last time, I tried to show how manly your officers are by releasing an audio clip where a male officer said to a female officer that he might have to squeeze next to her, but he would “love every second of it”. If that doesn’t show just how masculine and awesome your agents are, I don’t know what will… but I will keep trying.
You keep bringing me in for secondary screening, and since you have no probable cause or legal justification for it — other than the mandate that pretty much says you can do whatever you want — I am going to guess that you just enjoy my company. So for that, I thank you. I am sorry that sometimes we have our disagreements, but clearly that doesn’t bother you too much, so I will keep being me.
<3 Thank You Border Patrol (CBP),
Travis McCrea
Border guards go by a certain set of bizzaro land rules handed down to them in their training. It is far from a normal social situation. Because you’ve had problems in the past, it’s recorded in their system and they are seemingly obligated now to investigate you thoroughly every time. It’s a common pattern with everyone I know who’s had a problem.
The greater record of not having any recorded crap about you as you cross the border, the less crap they give you. If you had a NEXUS program card for example, watch how their attitude magically changes for the better, since you have the status as a ‘trusted traveler’ now. A friend of mine forgot about their nexus card when they were crossing the border in the normal line (because one person in their car didn’t have it), and they remembered to bring it out later. The border guard’s attitude changed immediately and mentioned something about the ‘trusted’ status.
Border guards are really bizzare to most people because they don’t know the training they go through and the threat model they have in their head. Once you learn what it is they make more sense and you can learn how to deal with them better.
For example, it’s pretty universal rule worldwide that border crossing have a no recording, no photos, no cell phones or communication device policies.
This was pretty brilliant, although the gifs didn’t seem totally necessary. Publish a link to the recordings? The current ones sound fun, and I’d be curious to listen to the previous as well.
I don’t travel very much. However, if I did, I’d want to respond to violations of my civil liberties in this way.
Good work, Travis.
You lost me here.
United States sounds like a fascist country day by day.
Gee, what could have caused it? Gee could it have been something like this http://falkvinge.net/2011/12/12/travis-mccrea-is-a-terrorist/ calling yourself a terrorist?
Well, shit, I should write a post here saying that I’m the President of the United States. Maybe I’d get Secret Service protection just in case I’m telling the truth.
it could be the reason, but that would only mean that they put my name into Google and saw the word “terrorist” and then ran with it. That’s fine, they have a short amount of time to detain me and will work with what they have.
That said, even a quick glance at the article will show that it is intended to show that anyone can be considered a terrorist, based on their beliefs.
not bad from officials who are supposed to be portrayers of ‘USA, Land of Freedom’
I loved the gifs! XD I’m going to have to copy you. (Though I didn’t get how a couple of them applied…)
Travis, as a US citizen please allow me to thank you for taking the time to write about your border crossing experiences. You are obviously upset with your treatment and from the sounds of it, from the most recent generation of those that have a sense of self entitlement, delusions of grandeur, and zero work ethic. Probably uneducated too but it’s not worth discussing in your case, because if you are educated, it didn’t really do much. Other than to perhaps land you a job in which you’re lazy, overpaid, and an absolute nightmare to your boss. But that’s ok, that is understandable as you are a Canadian and that’s how most of you act. I also understand your frustration with dealing with an actual secure country and its border. We all know that Canada can’t really fend for themselves (certainly not your fault), in that you’re still a cross between America’s unwanted bastard 51st state and England’s bitch. However, let me remind you that no one from the United States knocked on your door and asked you to come here. We are 90% of your economy so please do not give me the line we’ve all heard about you spending your tourist dollars here. We don’t need your tourist dollars and in fact, would prefer that you just stay in Canada and leave the border crossing to adults. As everyone in the service industry knows, Canadians are horribly cheap, rude, obnoxious, and don’t even have the decency to tip when it’s appropriate. Do the United States a favor Travis, gather up all your like-minded buddies, and find somewhere in Canada to spend your free time. You ARE not wanted here.
Wow. Just wow. Travis, a rebuttal?
As a /dual citizen/ of both the United States and Canada (and currently a US resident, traveling to the US on a US passport) the comment above is not only nationalist and ignorant of Canada and its vitality to the US economy, but also based on attacking one fact which was inaccurate. I see no further need to comment since I think the ignorance of the post speaks for itself.
Travis, I want to apologize for Sam’s comment. The majority of Americans highly value our Canadian brothers and sisters. Any one with a lick of sense would see his reply and reasoning is faulty when he said America’s borders were secure…… While illegal immigrants are flowing across our southern border by the thousands every day and we can’t stop them. I’ve been to Canada several times and was treated with respect and a friendly manner every time by the Canadian border guard. Strange though, on my return trips I would get an attitude from my own countrymen manning the US border.
I’m surprised that there is no agreement similar to Schengen between USA and Canada.
And that US border patrol treat canadians as if they were from Somalia or something.
In Europe you can travel from Tallinn to Gibraltar and no one will even check your passport.
I recently travelled to Ireland not as a tourist, but as a long term resident-immigrant.
And on the border they only looked at my passport for 10 seconds and that’s it.
No interviews, no pat downs TSA style – nothing.
They did not even ask why I was there.
And they did not check my luggage either.
It used to be close to this, but then 9/11 happened and it gave the excuse they wanted.
It’s stories that these that consistently reinforce my decision to never visit the US.
I’d love to go to Canada, but I won’t bother with USA.
Buffolo thought he liked WorldWar II again that he liked this joke of Civil Agents very well, Americans in Civil Services (like police) think on another level (like your great story above) and don’t forget that they are bloody warlike…pfff . Here cut/paste a message of (http://twitter.com/cbpbuffalo)… with this message he likes to go as #US-BorderPatrol over dead bodies again, he is so praud to be an American. Hang him high….
USCIS @USCIS 25 oktober
#TBT 12/4/56 Dozens of clerks from Europe sent to Austria help process Hungarian #refugees for #immigration to U.S.http://ow.ly/i/3wq82
Geretweet door Buffalo
By the way The Pirate Party in Sweden is realy okay, best wishes for May 2014
Travis, I read your great story, sorry but I thought about Rick and did not read something about your Party items, as a Dutchman is Sweden in my line of thinking (Wikileaks, Assange, Andersdotter, Iceland, Denmark). Even for you best wishes for 2014.
Mr Travis, i know this post is a few months old but i have a question. When you crossed the Border, were you questioned by CBP Officers or Border Patrol Agents? I am assuming you would know the difference since you claim to visit the US so often.
This were CBP Officers.
I know the image is of a Border Patrol agent and the title talks about “Border Patrol” but that is simply the best image available and people understand “Border Patrol” better.
[…] As you may know if you read this blog and my personal stuff regularly, in the past I have had issues at the US border. […]
I’v got a similar but worse experience at the border in 2011 It’s was my first visit to U.S by land
There were only insulting, threatening and ridiculing because i carried a bank statement in my car trunk(I always carry important stuffs in my car, I’m a small business guy) Since then, i began to really hate U.S government and Americans. I answered them everything honestly but they drove me a liar, the return was only insulting, threatening and ridiculing. It could be discrimination against Asian or something else?
As a Korean Canadian, I won’t forget their treat to me and will pay back as much as i was treated
Now I got to know that 9/11 is not a coincidence but inevitable
American better not come to Canada or S.Korea, Stay inside U.S soil forever.
This is why I have said — it makes way more sense that America has driven people to bomb them than the idiot George Bush pulled off such a perfect coverup around 9/11.
Thanks for your comment.
This is a sick fucking joke. No vacation, thanks to homeland security.
On August 21 2015 I was attempting to clear customs at the Peace Arch crossing border. I was asked by the agent if I had ever been arrested. I answered in the affirmative. I have been arrested twice. Neither offense was a crime of moral turpitude. One arrest dates back to 2008 and another to 2014. I showed him a copy of my peace bond and a letter from my lawyer explaining the circumstances and that I was not convicted of a crime and had no criminal record. This was my first time crossing the border as an adult, the last time I had been across was in 1993. I gave him my papers in a courteous fashion and he tells me to sit in the secondary inspection area. I do so. He very loudly began to repeat so everyone could here. “Don’t flip out. Don’t flip out. You’re in my country now. These are my brothers and sisters. Don’t flip out. If you flip out, I will put you down. You will be arrested if you flip out and do you know how long you will stay in jail here if you flip out? A very, very long time.” At no time during the process did I show any signs of aggression, frustration or disrespect to the officer or his station. I realize accessing your country is a privilege, not a right and nor do I view the guards concerns as frivolous and I do understand he has a job to do. He was verbally combative from the word go. This trip was to be a free vacation that my friend of two years had arranged for me. He grew frustrated because I did not populate as having a criminal record despite saying that I had been arrested. These charges were resolved with an absolute discharge, which I know is not recognized by the US. My peace bond did not populate because this was not a conviction, either. I have no pending charges and have not been in trouble with the police since October of last year. I have complied to all conditions and I have posed no threat to anyone. I researched admissibility prior to travelling. My charges do not carry any jail time, nor are the pardonable because the charges were stayed and I was not convicted of any crime. During the course of this, I witnessed him clear another gentleman to pass and his passport was actually revoked. Another had be refused entry but he let him through. I was informed that showing my provincial peace bond and lawyers letter was not enough. I needed to produce an RCMP record despite the fact I do not have a record. I asked how I was to prove I don’t have a record when I don’t have a record. I was told I needed to bring a proof of no record from the federal government, a copy of my bills and proof I have work and A rental agreement. He said if I brought that, I would be allowed to cross. He then suggested that I try crossing at a different border. “You don’t need to cross at this border.” Why would I cross at another border? Refusal is a refusal. It would be dishonest and it is clearly not what one does. I am trying to get the paperwork as requested. He took exception to the fact my vacation was to meet someone I had met online 2 years ago. He told me, “I want to know what site you met him on because if you’re planning on staying…” My mother is an American citizen. I should be an American citizen, considering I was stolen from her while she was deported in 1976. That is neither here nor there, but it raises questions for me. I was then asked if I worked. No, I do not at the moment but am in the process of trying to get into schooling. I receive a monthly disability cheque and I told the officer as much. I take medication and it is weekly dispensed. I cannot simply miss my medication, they are a necessity. I may not have a job, but I have bills for cable. I pay rent. I have an animal companion. I do not want to stay in your country longer than ten days. My first adult vacation in 30 years and I am treated in such an appalling fashion that all I could do was cry. The humiliation of being fingerprinted, photographed and then perp walked to the Canadian border agencies was the height of humiliation. My infraction,common assault, was mentioned and then he asked about my prior charge. Also similar in nature. Honesty is the best possibility and at no time did I attempt to deceive or coerce anyone. The acts were unlawful and I have paid for them. Even though I no longer have a record I am cognizant that my actions at the time were unlawful. His repeated questioning procured no false statements, no attempt to downplay or minimize them in any way. “How do I know you won’t do that here? Are you on medication?” “We don’t have any record on you.” This was humiliating and absolutely degrading. He was reading off a screen and he just seemed to take great joy in twisting things around. I understand it is subjective and up to the discretion of the officer. If so, why tell me to try and cross at a different border? I feel I was profiled and folded into a box that he arbitrarily place me in. I know our government shares information with yours, making me jump through hoops for amusement’s sake, which is what it truly appears to be is in my humble opinion, extremely un-American.