by Jen Mallia
Last updated: 10:10 AM ET, Wed March 19, 2025
The news of Vancouverite Jasmine Mooney returning home safely after a stint in American ICE detention centres is something to celebrate, but the situation is raising some questions and giving business travellers — many of whom are already feeling a bit leery of entering the U.S. — pause.
CTV News reports that Mooney was attempting to enter the U.S. from Mexico into San Diego for work, intending to apply for a visa at the border. She acknowledges she had previously had a work visa cancelled, but with a new job offer, figured she would be able to apply again.
When she got to the border, she was told she would not be permitted into the U.S. and would have to return to Canada.
From there, she was arrested and held in detention centres in California and Arizona, before being allowed to return to Canada, 12 days after her arrest.
When speaking to reporters upon her arrival home, Mooney was still unclear about the specifics of her case. “No one told me anything. Not once,” she said. “I still don’t even know how I’m home,” she added. “My friends and my family and the media are the reason, I think, that I’m home.”
Mooney’s story is not the only one of a person being detained in what one may assume to be normal circumstances, or following what appears to be an honest mistake.
Becky Burke is a Welsh comic artist who is being held in an ICE detention centre in Tacoma, WA, the BBC reports. She was denied entry to Canada on the suspicion she would be working while here, for which she did not have a visa.
She had been staying in the U.S. on an arrangement that saw her helping around the house of her host in exchange for a place to stay. Although unpaid, it was determined at the border that the arrangement violated the terms of her visitor’s visa and she was taken into custody.
Her family has been trying to arrange for her return to the U.K. but has been having trouble finding out how exactly to do that. According to the BBC report, a judge must approve her request for a voluntary departure. The news item reports insight from Melissa Chavin, a U.S. immigration lawyer based in London. Chavin shared that “Ms. Burke could be released either through voluntary departure or expedited removal, but the process of appearing in front of a judge as part of voluntary departure could be delayed because several dozen of the approximately 700 immigration judges had resigned or been fired by the Trump administration.”
The stories of these two women are different from some other stories of people in detention in that they both wanted and had access to the resources to leave the U.S. but were prevented by bureaucracy from going home. Burke tells heart wrenching stories of fellow inmates “who have family in the U.S. and are unwilling or unable to return to their home nations.”
Reports of people who have been detained in immigration centres over what could be construed as minor visa issues have been particularly worrisome to people who travel transborder in the course of their work.
The U.S. Department of State website states “While citizens of Canada and Bermuda generally do not need visas to conduct temporary business, some purposes of travel may require a visa.” Temporary business is specified as: “Attending business meetings or consultations, attending a business convention or conference, and negotiating contracts.”
Still, at the rate policies and standards of protocol are changing in the U.S. government, some travellers feel anxious, particularly if their work doesn’t fit neatly into one of the three categories listed as “temporary work” or if they don’t have Canadian citizenship.
None of the business travellers I spoke to wanted to go on record with their concerns, but a feeling that crossing the border feels more fraught than it used to was a recurring theme. Some felt emphasising the leisure aspect of their trip was a safer bet than bringing up the work part. One felt it was important to clarify she was travelling “for business,” rather than “to work.” Another said it seemed border agents were more at ease when he showed business cards that show their place of work is in Canada.
The U.S. government is clear: “U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officials at the port-of-entry have authority to permit or deny admission to the United States.” Being detained is a whole different ballgame from being denied entry though.
“In the 17 years I’ve been practising immigration law, I’ve never heard of a TN visa holder being detained for days on end and not being allowed to enter,” says Jim Hacking, founder of Hacking Immigration Law in St. Louis, Mo., as reported by the Canadian Press. [A TN visa is the kind of visa Jasmine Mooney was applying for.]
Hacking sees the situation as emblematic of a plan to stop immigration into the U.S.
“They don’t want people coming to the United States,” he says.
“I have lots of clients from Canada,” Hacking continues. “I do believe that many Canadians have taken it way too casually with their immigration status over the years.”
Vancouver-based immigration lawyer Richard Kurland also told the Canadian Press that border crossings are changing for Canadians and reminds travellers that the role of a border agent is not to facilitate entrance to their country.
He advises that travellers “need to be as forthright with border agents as possible, and assumptions that some crossings are easier to enter than others should be discounted.”
Transborder crossings into the United States are already down. With traveller anxiety being fed by the threat of detention, it seems likely they will continue to fall.
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