July 14, 2025 • 17 mins
In this episode of One Thing Trump Did, we look at how the Trump administration's policies may be discouraging foreign visitors from traveling to the United States. Jeremy is joined by Forbes reporter Suzanne Rowan Kelleher, who covers travel and tourism. #travel #tourism #US #Canada #Europe #Mexico #Trump
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:15):
Welcome to One Thing Trump Did, Available exclusively on The
Middle podcast Speed. I'm Jeremy Hobson, and each week on
this show, we picked just one thing coming out of
the Trump White House to focus on it and talk
about it in a non partisan way with someone who
knows what they're talking about. In this episode, we're talking
not so much about an action, but a reaction to
a number of things that President Trump is doing. The
(00:36):
reaction is coming from tourists around the world who are
deciding not to come to the United States. Maybe it's
because of tougher immigration policies and fears about getting detained
by authorities. Maybe it's about the tariffs or pulling out
of diplomatic or economic agreements. A recent study from the
World Travel and Tourism Council that analyzed the economic impact
of tourism to one hundred and eighty four countries found
(00:59):
that the u U was the only country forecast to
see a decline in international visitor spending in twenty twenty five.
People in places that international tourists visit are already seeing
the effects. Here's a Los Angeles tour bus operator named
Kami Farhadi speaking with CBS.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
News in the first quarter of this year, we're down
about twenty nine to thirty percent.
Speaker 3 (01:22):
And what are they saying when they cancel? They don't
feel safe, they don't feel welcome.
Speaker 1 (01:28):
And here is Nevada Congressman Stephen Horsford speaking with next
Gen America.
Speaker 4 (01:32):
We have forty million people who come to Las Vegas
from all over the world, but we've already seen a
decline of seventeen percent of travelers from Canada to Las
Vegas in just the first few months since the start
of this year. It's the tariffs, but it's also the
(01:53):
fact that they don't feel welcome.
Speaker 1 (01:56):
Joining me now is Forbes reporter Suzanne Rowan kellerher who
covers travel and tourism. Suzanne, great to have you on.
Speaker 3 (02:03):
Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (02:04):
So give us the big picture. First of all, what
does the decline look like so far? Where people are
seeing it?
Speaker 2 (02:10):
Well, the US coming into twenty twenty five was expecting
a nine percent increase in tourism from international visitors, and
that figure came from Tourism Economics, which is a division
of Oxford Economics.
Speaker 3 (02:26):
So they were.
Speaker 2 (02:26):
Expecting about sixteen point five billion dollars extra on top
of what of the two hundred and fifty four billion
they brought in last year just solely from international tourists instead,
now they're projecting an eight point two percent decrease. So
(02:47):
the variants of seventeen point two percent is a lot,
and that really adds up to about twenty nine billion
dollars that tourism officials believe were missing out on this year.
Speaker 1 (03:00):
And we heard there from Los Angeles and Las Vegas.
Are those the places or where are the places where
this is going to be seen the most? From international
tourists deciding not to come.
Speaker 2 (03:09):
In one way, it's kind of all over, but in
very specific way. Canadians are the biggest group that are
not coming. Last year, Canadians made up a quarter of
all international tourists to the US. They spent twenty point
five billion dollars in the US. And to put that
number into context, because I think a lot of times
(03:31):
people hear this big number and just they can't really
picture it, but it's twice what Americans spent on McDonald's
all last year. Wow, So they spent a lot of
money and they're having a boycott, so those numbers are
really down. Yesterday we found out from Statistics Canada that
in June thirty three percent, so a whole third fewer
(03:54):
Canadians came across the border than last year.
Speaker 3 (03:58):
Most Canadians traveling.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
By car, so that really impacts the border states from
mot Maine, Michigan, Washington, et cetera. And then you have Florida,
which has a lot of tourism from all all.
Speaker 3 (04:14):
Over the world. They're also seeing a decrease.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
You know, it's interesting that Canadians make up such a
big portion of the international tourists coming to this country
if you think about just domestically. I remember I grew
up in Illinois, and I remember hearing that the biggest
amount of people that go and visit Chicago as tourists
are people from other parts of Illinois. Probably some of
the biggest tourists in New York City are people from
the surrounding states because it's easy to get there and
(04:37):
they can drive, they can get in easily by train.
So it makes sense that the Canadians would be the
ones that we would see this the most, especially because
Trump has specifically gone after Canadians in a number of ways,
including saying that they should be the fifty first state,
which they don't like. For the most part.
Speaker 2 (04:52):
Right, I mean, there is that we really saw this
takeoff after the tariffs were announced. But actually, for Canada,
Trump was talking about making Canada the fifty first state
back when Trudeau was still Prime Minister, and he started
talking in February about a boycott. Telling people, look, don't
spend your tourism dollars in the United States was one
(05:14):
of the last things he said as he left office
in April. And really that boycott has only gotten stronger
month to month.
Speaker 1 (05:22):
Where are people going instead or do we know that
at this point?
Speaker 2 (05:26):
We do and we know that from Interestingly, the Hotel
Corporation's earnings calls. Hotel executives got on you know, I
think back in May to talk about their first quarter
earnings and they said all the multinational companies were like, well,
you know, they're not coming to the US. The Canadians
(05:48):
aren't coming to the US. But they're going to Mexico,
and they're going to the Caribbean, and they're going to
Europe and we get their business when they go there too.
So we're seeing that the Canadian travelers are it's not
like they're staying home traveling, they're just not coming to
the US.
Speaker 3 (06:02):
And we're also.
Speaker 2 (06:03):
Seeing declines from Europe, Germany, Denmark, as you can imagine
after the Greenland talk. But you know, really down from Europe,
down from Canada, Mexico, really every country is down, almost
except maybe I wanted to say, I saw stat where
Brazil might have been up a little bit or level,
but that's the outlier.
Speaker 1 (06:24):
I was just in Europe and I heard from some
people who said that they don't want to come into
the United States right now because they're worried that they're
going to be stopped, detained, question just because of the
tougher immigration policies of the Trump administration. Which is interesting
because years ago I remember speaking with friends in the
UK who said that they didn't want to come in
(06:44):
and move back to the United States. These or Americans
who've been living in the UK for a while because
they were worried about school shootings for their kids. That
was the issue. Now it's they're worried about, you know,
immigration stuff.
Speaker 2 (06:54):
Yeah, I mean, the headlines are brutal, and like Canada.
Going back to Canada, there is a retired Minister of
Parliament from Canada called Charlie Angus who is very vocal
on social media and he is saying, don't go to
the United States, and he keeps calling attention to the
fact that apparently ICE has fifty five Canadians who had
(07:19):
lawful visas.
Speaker 3 (07:20):
To enter the US and they've been detained. So there
is a lot of fear.
Speaker 2 (07:25):
I've even frankly heard of Americans who are afraid to
you know, they want to bring a burner phone when
they travel so that when they come back to the
US they won't have their phone searched. You know, Homeland
Security tells me that it's a very tiny percentage of
Americans that would ever have their phones looked at, But
(07:48):
you do hear these stories. And the La Times had
a headline a story I think like a week ago
where somebody came in and was detained for about forty
five minutes, wasn't given a reason, and his what he
told the paper was that he thinks it was the
Obama T shirt he had in his carry on bag.
(08:08):
So and there there are you know, there are other
instances of people claiming that they've been asked do you
like Trump? As one of the questions when they come in.
So all of these, when you put them all together,
it just, you know, kind of makes people think twice.
And you had the World Tourism of Trade Council, their
(08:29):
president said, the US has basically the welcome mat has
been rolled up. You get that kind of feeling when
you look at the stats too.
Speaker 1 (08:37):
Well, you had talked about the fact that it's a
couple hundred billion dollars worth just international tourism to the
United States in terms of the overall revenue that comes in.
Was it on the upswing before? Like, is the industry
just going what in the world is going on right now?
This is not what we were expecting to happen.
Speaker 2 (08:57):
Yeah, Well, of course everything came to a grinding call
during the pandemic. So a lot of times the stat
that they look at is twenty nineteen and they compare
everything back to that. We were not in twenty twenty four.
We had not hit twenty nineteen numbers yet. But twenty
(09:17):
twenty five was supposed to be a banner year, and
you heard that from the airlines. Delta said it was
going to be their best every year. That's not happening
pretty much. Any industry in the travel sphere is not
having a great year.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
Well, and in a moment, I want to ask you
about what the industry is doing to try to reverse
this trend of a stand by one Thing Trump did
with Bores reporter Suzanne Row and Kelliher will be right back.
(10:05):
Welcome back to One Thing Trump did exclusively on the
Middle podcast Feed. I'm Jeremy Hobson. This episode, we're talking
about what's happening to international tourism to America because of President
Trump's policies and rhetoric. I'm joined by Forbes supporter Suzanne
rowan Kelleher. Do you get this sense right now that
the administration is worried about this decline in international tourism?
Speaker 2 (10:27):
All I can go by is when I reach out
to the Department of Homeland Security and raise the issue.
Their responses, we're, you know, we're doing everything to keep
American safe. This is necessary for our immigration agenda. The
US Travel Association, which is sort of a lobby group
for the industry, they are very concerned. They've put out statements.
(10:50):
I think everybody's very guarded. I'm going to be honest,
like I've talked to government officials who do not want
to be named in stories. Parks are seeing that, you know,
they have fewer international travelers, so it's hard to get
to read the kind of the company line from any
government agency. Is not a problem where the United States.
(11:13):
Of course people are going to come. But you know,
I just wrote a story this morning about the World
Cup next year, and if you look at the Big
Beautiful Bill, there are a number of things in that
bill that really I think are going to make tourism
officials a little bit crazy and really kind of fearful.
(11:35):
So the US again for next year, they're expecting a
heyday because of the World Cup. The Big Beautiful Bill
has a couple of provisions. One, they're slashing the budget
of Brand USA, which is the marketing arm, from one
hundred million to twenty million, so it's an eighty percent cut.
Then you have this new visa fee it's called the
(11:55):
Visa Integrity Fee that was kind of slapped into the
Big Beautiful Bill.
Speaker 3 (12:01):
It's a two.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
Hundred and fifty dollars fee per person on top of
all the other fees that tourists already pay when they
come to the US.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
Just for any tourist that has to pay.
Speaker 2 (12:11):
Yeah, yeah, so you have I mean, I think there
are some countries that are exempt, but like a country
like India, for example, you know they're already paying one
hundred and eighty five dollars for just you know, an
entry visa. Now they've got this, So they're talking about
four hundred and thirty five dollars before they even get
to the United States, right per person.
Speaker 3 (12:31):
So for a couple, that's almost one thousand dollars.
Speaker 2 (12:34):
For a family that's two thousand dollars that I think
is going to have a very chilling effect. Those are
the two big ones that are in the bill that
I think tourism officials are very concerned about.
Speaker 1 (12:45):
So you mentioned the World Cup. There are also going
to be some other big events hosted by the United States,
the Ryder Cup twenty twenty five, of course, the Olympics
in Los Angeles and the Paralympic Games in twenty twenty eight.
Are experts worried about attendance to these huge global events.
Speaker 2 (13:03):
When I ask people early on after the tariffs were announced,
I would ask tourism officials if they were concerned about
the World Cup and they would say, no, no, that's
very far away, and soccer fans will come. Now you're
seeing a little bit of hedging and FIFA, when they
have done their analysis of what economic impact World Cup
(13:25):
will have for the US. They are projecting a thirty
point five billion dollar boom, but that is projecting a
lot of foreign visitors, And what FIFA has told the
host cities is that they'll be getting half of their
visitation from domestic and half from foreign. Well, if you're
(13:46):
kind of hamstringing the foreign element, I think there might
be reason for a little bit of concern that they're
going to be able to fill those stadiums. You could
see already that the Club World Cup had to drastically
cut ticket price to fill those stadiums.
Speaker 1 (14:02):
You know, if you ever travel abroad from the United States,
sometimes there are travel advisories to countries that you're visiting.
Maybe there's disease or social unrest or conflict going on.
Have any countries put travel advisories like that on the
United States?
Speaker 3 (14:18):
There are a few.
Speaker 2 (14:19):
A lot of them have to do with the LGBTQ
provisions that for example, if you have a sex marker
as an X on your passport instead of an MR andF.
That has been something that Trump administration has been going after.
So countries have warned people to be very careful. They've
warned them about saying anything as they're clearing customs carrying
(14:43):
anti Trump paraphernalia or anything like that. So there there's
definitely a lot of chatter. I think to get to
the stage where you actually issue a travel warning, that's
a big deal, and we have seen a couple of those.
Speaker 1 (14:56):
So you mentioned Brand USA and the tourism ororganizations. What
about the companies, because it does seem like when Trump
makes a policy and then you know, his buddy a
CEO goes golfing with them and says, you know, this
is really bad for us. Then he comes back, well,
maybe we're not going to have the immigration policies affect
the farming industry or retail or something like that. Are
(15:19):
the hotel companies, the you know, airlines, Are they going
to the administration and saying, uh, this is a real problem.
Speaker 2 (15:27):
They might be privately, you do not see it publicly.
Speaker 3 (15:30):
You see a.
Speaker 2 (15:31):
Little bit in the earnings calls, usually in response to
a question from like an analyst or somebody in the media.
They might acknowledge that these are turbulent times or that
the economic landscape is very uncertain, but they I have
not heard anybody go specifically and say this is the
(15:52):
fault of the Trump administration.
Speaker 1 (15:55):
If there is a big decline in international tourism that
is sustained over the next couple of years, is that
something that gets reversed if there's a new president that
comes in, or is this something that really will affect
the United States for a long time and it's image
and brand among tourists.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
Well, I've spoken to multiple people at Tourism Economics. They
seem to be of the mind that this is going
to last, maybe not at this degree, but they call
it sentiment headwinds are going to last through this administration.
And I think that it's different. Like if it was
just the tariffs, right, then you flip the switch. If
(16:35):
you take the tariffs away, people come. People should be
coming from overseas because the dollar has really gone down
quite a bit, like ten percent since the beginning of
the year. This should make it cheaper for people to
come to the US, but they're not coming. I mean,
obviously lots of people are coming, but the percentage dip
is adding up to a big loss.
Speaker 1 (16:56):
That is Suzanne Rowan Kelleher who covers travel and tourism
for Suzanne, thank you so much for joining us.
Speaker 3 (17:02):
Thank you for having me and thanks to.
Speaker 1 (17:04):
You for listening to One thing Trump did. It was
produced by Harrison Patino. Our next middle episode is coming
to your podcast feed later this week. We're going to
be asking you about the safety of social media for
kids who reportedly spend four or five six more hours
a day on social media at this point. If you
like this podcast, rate it wherever you get your podcast,
write as a review. Our theme music was composed by
Noah Haidu. I'm Jeremy Hobson. Talk to you soon.
Welcome to One Thing Trump Did, Available exclusively on The
Middle podcast Speed. I'm Jeremy Hobson, and each week on
this show, we picked just one thing coming out of
the Trump White House to focus on it and talk
about it in a non partisan way with someone who
knows what they're talking about. In this episode, we're talking
not so much about an action, but a reaction to
a number of things that President Trump is doing. The
(00:36):
reaction is coming from tourists around the world who are
deciding not to come to the United States. Maybe it's
because of tougher immigration policies and fears about getting detained
by authorities. Maybe it's about the tariffs or pulling out
of diplomatic or economic agreements. A recent study from the
World Travel and Tourism Council that analyzed the economic impact
of tourism to one hundred and eighty four countries found
(00:59):
that the u U was the only country forecast to
see a decline in international visitor spending in twenty twenty five.
People in places that international tourists visit are already seeing
the effects. Here's a Los Angeles tour bus operator named
Kami Farhadi speaking with CBS.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
News in the first quarter of this year, we're down
about twenty nine to thirty percent.
Speaker 3 (01:22):
And what are they saying when they cancel? They don't
feel safe, they don't feel welcome.
Speaker 1 (01:28):
And here is Nevada Congressman Stephen Horsford speaking with next
Gen America.
Speaker 4 (01:32):
We have forty million people who come to Las Vegas
from all over the world, but we've already seen a
decline of seventeen percent of travelers from Canada to Las
Vegas in just the first few months since the start
of this year. It's the tariffs, but it's also the
(01:53):
fact that they don't feel welcome.
Speaker 1 (01:56):
Joining me now is Forbes reporter Suzanne Rowan kellerher who
covers travel and tourism. Suzanne, great to have you on.
Speaker 3 (02:03):
Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (02:04):
So give us the big picture. First of all, what
does the decline look like so far? Where people are
seeing it?
Speaker 2 (02:10):
Well, the US coming into twenty twenty five was expecting
a nine percent increase in tourism from international visitors, and
that figure came from Tourism Economics, which is a division
of Oxford Economics.
Speaker 3 (02:26):
So they were.
Speaker 2 (02:26):
Expecting about sixteen point five billion dollars extra on top
of what of the two hundred and fifty four billion
they brought in last year just solely from international tourists instead,
now they're projecting an eight point two percent decrease. So
(02:47):
the variants of seventeen point two percent is a lot,
and that really adds up to about twenty nine billion
dollars that tourism officials believe were missing out on this year.
Speaker 1 (03:00):
And we heard there from Los Angeles and Las Vegas.
Are those the places or where are the places where
this is going to be seen the most? From international
tourists deciding not to come.
Speaker 2 (03:09):
In one way, it's kind of all over, but in
very specific way. Canadians are the biggest group that are
not coming. Last year, Canadians made up a quarter of
all international tourists to the US. They spent twenty point
five billion dollars in the US. And to put that
number into context, because I think a lot of times
(03:31):
people hear this big number and just they can't really
picture it, but it's twice what Americans spent on McDonald's
all last year. Wow, So they spent a lot of
money and they're having a boycott, so those numbers are
really down. Yesterday we found out from Statistics Canada that
in June thirty three percent, so a whole third fewer
(03:54):
Canadians came across the border than last year.
Speaker 3 (03:58):
Most Canadians traveling.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
By car, so that really impacts the border states from
mot Maine, Michigan, Washington, et cetera. And then you have Florida,
which has a lot of tourism from all all.
Speaker 3 (04:14):
Over the world. They're also seeing a decrease.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
You know, it's interesting that Canadians make up such a
big portion of the international tourists coming to this country
if you think about just domestically. I remember I grew
up in Illinois, and I remember hearing that the biggest
amount of people that go and visit Chicago as tourists
are people from other parts of Illinois. Probably some of
the biggest tourists in New York City are people from
the surrounding states because it's easy to get there and
(04:37):
they can drive, they can get in easily by train.
So it makes sense that the Canadians would be the
ones that we would see this the most, especially because
Trump has specifically gone after Canadians in a number of ways,
including saying that they should be the fifty first state,
which they don't like. For the most part.
Speaker 2 (04:52):
Right, I mean, there is that we really saw this
takeoff after the tariffs were announced. But actually, for Canada,
Trump was talking about making Canada the fifty first state
back when Trudeau was still Prime Minister, and he started
talking in February about a boycott. Telling people, look, don't
spend your tourism dollars in the United States was one
(05:14):
of the last things he said as he left office
in April. And really that boycott has only gotten stronger
month to month.
Speaker 1 (05:22):
Where are people going instead or do we know that
at this point?
Speaker 2 (05:26):
We do and we know that from Interestingly, the Hotel
Corporation's earnings calls. Hotel executives got on you know, I
think back in May to talk about their first quarter
earnings and they said all the multinational companies were like, well,
you know, they're not coming to the US. The Canadians
(05:48):
aren't coming to the US. But they're going to Mexico,
and they're going to the Caribbean, and they're going to
Europe and we get their business when they go there too.
So we're seeing that the Canadian travelers are it's not
like they're staying home traveling, they're just not coming to
the US.
Speaker 3 (06:02):
And we're also.
Speaker 2 (06:03):
Seeing declines from Europe, Germany, Denmark, as you can imagine
after the Greenland talk. But you know, really down from Europe,
down from Canada, Mexico, really every country is down, almost
except maybe I wanted to say, I saw stat where
Brazil might have been up a little bit or level,
but that's the outlier.
Speaker 1 (06:24):
I was just in Europe and I heard from some
people who said that they don't want to come into
the United States right now because they're worried that they're
going to be stopped, detained, question just because of the
tougher immigration policies of the Trump administration. Which is interesting
because years ago I remember speaking with friends in the
UK who said that they didn't want to come in
(06:44):
and move back to the United States. These or Americans
who've been living in the UK for a while because
they were worried about school shootings for their kids. That
was the issue. Now it's they're worried about, you know,
immigration stuff.
Speaker 2 (06:54):
Yeah, I mean, the headlines are brutal, and like Canada.
Going back to Canada, there is a retired Minister of
Parliament from Canada called Charlie Angus who is very vocal
on social media and he is saying, don't go to
the United States, and he keeps calling attention to the
fact that apparently ICE has fifty five Canadians who had
(07:19):
lawful visas.
Speaker 3 (07:20):
To enter the US and they've been detained. So there
is a lot of fear.
Speaker 2 (07:25):
I've even frankly heard of Americans who are afraid to
you know, they want to bring a burner phone when
they travel so that when they come back to the
US they won't have their phone searched. You know, Homeland
Security tells me that it's a very tiny percentage of
Americans that would ever have their phones looked at, But
(07:48):
you do hear these stories. And the La Times had
a headline a story I think like a week ago
where somebody came in and was detained for about forty
five minutes, wasn't given a reason, and his what he
told the paper was that he thinks it was the
Obama T shirt he had in his carry on bag.
(08:08):
So and there there are you know, there are other
instances of people claiming that they've been asked do you
like Trump? As one of the questions when they come in.
So all of these, when you put them all together,
it just, you know, kind of makes people think twice.
And you had the World Tourism of Trade Council, their
(08:29):
president said, the US has basically the welcome mat has
been rolled up. You get that kind of feeling when
you look at the stats too.
Speaker 1 (08:37):
Well, you had talked about the fact that it's a
couple hundred billion dollars worth just international tourism to the
United States in terms of the overall revenue that comes in.
Was it on the upswing before? Like, is the industry
just going what in the world is going on right now?
This is not what we were expecting to happen.
Speaker 2 (08:57):
Yeah, Well, of course everything came to a grinding call
during the pandemic. So a lot of times the stat
that they look at is twenty nineteen and they compare
everything back to that. We were not in twenty twenty four.
We had not hit twenty nineteen numbers yet. But twenty
(09:17):
twenty five was supposed to be a banner year, and
you heard that from the airlines. Delta said it was
going to be their best every year. That's not happening
pretty much. Any industry in the travel sphere is not
having a great year.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
Well, and in a moment, I want to ask you
about what the industry is doing to try to reverse
this trend of a stand by one Thing Trump did
with Bores reporter Suzanne Row and Kelliher will be right back.
(10:05):
Welcome back to One Thing Trump did exclusively on the
Middle podcast Feed. I'm Jeremy Hobson. This episode, we're talking
about what's happening to international tourism to America because of President
Trump's policies and rhetoric. I'm joined by Forbes supporter Suzanne
rowan Kelleher. Do you get this sense right now that
the administration is worried about this decline in international tourism?
Speaker 2 (10:27):
All I can go by is when I reach out
to the Department of Homeland Security and raise the issue.
Their responses, we're, you know, we're doing everything to keep
American safe. This is necessary for our immigration agenda. The
US Travel Association, which is sort of a lobby group
for the industry, they are very concerned. They've put out statements.
(10:50):
I think everybody's very guarded. I'm going to be honest,
like I've talked to government officials who do not want
to be named in stories. Parks are seeing that, you know,
they have fewer international travelers, so it's hard to get
to read the kind of the company line from any
government agency. Is not a problem where the United States.
(11:13):
Of course people are going to come. But you know,
I just wrote a story this morning about the World
Cup next year, and if you look at the Big
Beautiful Bill, there are a number of things in that
bill that really I think are going to make tourism
officials a little bit crazy and really kind of fearful.
(11:35):
So the US again for next year, they're expecting a
heyday because of the World Cup. The Big Beautiful Bill
has a couple of provisions. One, they're slashing the budget
of Brand USA, which is the marketing arm, from one
hundred million to twenty million, so it's an eighty percent cut.
Then you have this new visa fee it's called the
(11:55):
Visa Integrity Fee that was kind of slapped into the
Big Beautiful Bill.
Speaker 3 (12:01):
It's a two.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
Hundred and fifty dollars fee per person on top of
all the other fees that tourists already pay when they
come to the US.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
Just for any tourist that has to pay.
Speaker 2 (12:11):
Yeah, yeah, so you have I mean, I think there
are some countries that are exempt, but like a country
like India, for example, you know they're already paying one
hundred and eighty five dollars for just you know, an
entry visa. Now they've got this, So they're talking about
four hundred and thirty five dollars before they even get
to the United States, right per person.
Speaker 3 (12:31):
So for a couple, that's almost one thousand dollars.
Speaker 2 (12:34):
For a family that's two thousand dollars that I think
is going to have a very chilling effect. Those are
the two big ones that are in the bill that
I think tourism officials are very concerned about.
Speaker 1 (12:45):
So you mentioned the World Cup. There are also going
to be some other big events hosted by the United States,
the Ryder Cup twenty twenty five, of course, the Olympics
in Los Angeles and the Paralympic Games in twenty twenty eight.
Are experts worried about attendance to these huge global events.
Speaker 2 (13:03):
When I ask people early on after the tariffs were announced,
I would ask tourism officials if they were concerned about
the World Cup and they would say, no, no, that's
very far away, and soccer fans will come. Now you're
seeing a little bit of hedging and FIFA, when they
have done their analysis of what economic impact World Cup
(13:25):
will have for the US. They are projecting a thirty
point five billion dollar boom, but that is projecting a
lot of foreign visitors, And what FIFA has told the
host cities is that they'll be getting half of their
visitation from domestic and half from foreign. Well, if you're
(13:46):
kind of hamstringing the foreign element, I think there might
be reason for a little bit of concern that they're
going to be able to fill those stadiums. You could
see already that the Club World Cup had to drastically
cut ticket price to fill those stadiums.
Speaker 1 (14:02):
You know, if you ever travel abroad from the United States,
sometimes there are travel advisories to countries that you're visiting.
Maybe there's disease or social unrest or conflict going on.
Have any countries put travel advisories like that on the
United States?
Speaker 3 (14:18):
There are a few.
Speaker 2 (14:19):
A lot of them have to do with the LGBTQ
provisions that for example, if you have a sex marker
as an X on your passport instead of an MR andF.
That has been something that Trump administration has been going after.
So countries have warned people to be very careful. They've
warned them about saying anything as they're clearing customs carrying
(14:43):
anti Trump paraphernalia or anything like that. So there there's
definitely a lot of chatter. I think to get to
the stage where you actually issue a travel warning, that's
a big deal, and we have seen a couple of those.
Speaker 1 (14:56):
So you mentioned Brand USA and the tourism ororganizations. What
about the companies, because it does seem like when Trump
makes a policy and then you know, his buddy a
CEO goes golfing with them and says, you know, this
is really bad for us. Then he comes back, well,
maybe we're not going to have the immigration policies affect
the farming industry or retail or something like that. Are
(15:19):
the hotel companies, the you know, airlines, Are they going
to the administration and saying, uh, this is a real problem.
Speaker 2 (15:27):
They might be privately, you do not see it publicly.
Speaker 3 (15:30):
You see a.
Speaker 2 (15:31):
Little bit in the earnings calls, usually in response to
a question from like an analyst or somebody in the media.
They might acknowledge that these are turbulent times or that
the economic landscape is very uncertain, but they I have
not heard anybody go specifically and say this is the
(15:52):
fault of the Trump administration.
Speaker 1 (15:55):
If there is a big decline in international tourism that
is sustained over the next couple of years, is that
something that gets reversed if there's a new president that
comes in, or is this something that really will affect
the United States for a long time and it's image
and brand among tourists.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
Well, I've spoken to multiple people at Tourism Economics. They
seem to be of the mind that this is going
to last, maybe not at this degree, but they call
it sentiment headwinds are going to last through this administration.
And I think that it's different. Like if it was
just the tariffs, right, then you flip the switch. If
(16:35):
you take the tariffs away, people come. People should be
coming from overseas because the dollar has really gone down
quite a bit, like ten percent since the beginning of
the year. This should make it cheaper for people to
come to the US, but they're not coming. I mean,
obviously lots of people are coming, but the percentage dip
is adding up to a big loss.
Speaker 1 (16:56):
That is Suzanne Rowan Kelleher who covers travel and tourism
for Suzanne, thank you so much for joining us.
Speaker 3 (17:02):
Thank you for having me and thanks to.
Speaker 1 (17:04):
You for listening to One thing Trump did. It was
produced by Harrison Patino. Our next middle episode is coming
to your podcast feed later this week. We're going to
be asking you about the safety of social media for
kids who reportedly spend four or five six more hours
a day on social media at this point. If you
like this podcast, rate it wherever you get your podcast,
write as a review. Our theme music was composed by
Noah Haidu. I'm Jeremy Hobson. Talk to you soon.
Host
Jeremy Hobson
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