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Mozilla Employee Denied Entry To the United States (gizmodo.com)

Posted by msmash on from the here-we-go dept.

Reader Artem Tashkinov writes: Daniel Stenberg, an employee at Mozilla and the author of the command-line tool curl, was not allowed to board his flight to the meeting from Sweden—despite the fact that he'd previously obtained a visa waiver allowing him to travel to the US. Stenberg was unable to check in for his flight, and was notified at the airport ticket counter that his entry to the US had been denied. Although Mozilla doesn't believe that the incident is related to Trump's travel ban, the incident stirred fears among international tech workers, who fear they'll miss out on work and research opportunities if they're not allowed to travel to the US. The situation even caught the eye of Microsoft's chief legal officer Brad Smith, who tweeted at Stenberg to offer legal assistance.

9 of 420 comments (clear)

  1. Protectionist state by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    As the US moves towards isolation and protectionism with both its immigration and tariff plans, it may turn into another hermit kingdom clone of DPRK and you could see states like Russia or China move to preeminence in world affairs, with Trump presiding over a culturally homogeneous but irrelevant and poverty stricken country.

    1. Re:Protectionist state by slack_justyb · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I can't imagine Congress is going to let this go on forever.

      Well the cynic in me thinks that in order for it to stop, Congress would have to *act*. There's been a whole lot of *not acting* going on in Congress as of late, and I'm perplexed as to why an economic downturn would induce that to suddenly change. Considering the most recent AHCA version to come out of the Senate, it doesn't seem like they care if the citizens die, so economic hardship should be the least of their worries. Even if it's industry that's hurting, it's not GOP industry hurting.

    2. Re:Protectionist state by fahrbot-bot · · Score: 4, Insightful

      That's because what is being pushed thru is not "health care reform" but a partial rollback of the ACA reform.

      The current bills in the House and, more so, the Senate are more about cutting taxes, almost entirely benefiting the wealthy, than anything having to do with actual heath care, to allow conservative tax reform, also almost entirely benefiting the wealthy, to proceed using special procedural rules known as reconciliation to pass changes with a simple majority vote and avoid a Democratic filibuster. "Legislation cannot add to the deficit outside the customary 10-year budget window and be eligible for this procedural protection."

      This is why Congress started with health-care "reform" before tax reform - to save money in the budget on the former so it can be squandered on the latter.

      --
      It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
  2. Even though this has nothing to do with a policy by SensitiveMale · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I don't like, I'm going to say "fuck it" and link them anyways.

  3. Sweden by JBMcB · · Score: 5, Insightful

    So he's traveling from Sweden, which has nothing to do with the travel ban. So why does the article keep mentioning the travel ban?

    --
    My Other Computer Is A Data General Nova III.
    1. Re:Sweden by d3bruts1d · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Because Gizmodo has become overly political since the fall of Gawker.

    2. Re:Sweden by david_thornley · · Score: 4, Insightful

      No, there is a story. Person in Sweden going to the US on routine business, having presumably done the appropriate paperwork, is denied entry. This is bad.

      The only reason international meetings happen is to get people from other countries. For this to happen, potential attendees have to have a high degree of conference that they can get to them. If this becomes dubious for meetings in the US, such meetings will not happen in the US, which hurts assorted people in the US, including the business community and the scientific community.

      --
      "When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
  4. Re:I sure hope by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 5, Insightful

    as much as people want to complain. traveling to the US is not a right.

    I don't think many people are arguing that these travel restrictions are illegal, just that they are stupid and counterproductive. My company has offices in San Jose and Shanghai. Since our employees in China have difficulty getting visas to come to America for meetings and conferences, the Americans go to Shanghai instead, putting money into the Chinese economy, eating at Chinese restaurants, and staying at Chinese hotels.

    Since American employees incur these additional travel expenses, we are more biased toward hiring in China instead.

    No country has ever thrived by shutting itself off from the world.

    Anyway, I am going to Shanghai in July for 3 months, and my family is going with me. We plan to spend plenty of American dollars trying every new restaurant on Nanjing Road, all at company expense (tax deductible). Thank you Donald Trump!

  5. Re:I sure hope by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 5, Insightful

    You do realize that setting up a video conference would greatly reduce your travel costs

    You do realize that using video conferencing instead of face-to-face collaboration doesn't work near as well in practice as it does in theory?

    If Skype was a perfect substitute for commuting, the highways of Silicon Valley would be empty every morning.