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Welsh backpacker detained in US says she was ‘naive’ about border crackdown

05 Apr 2025 3 minute read
Rebecca Burke, 28, with her parents. Photo Family Handout/PA Wire

A Welsh backpacker who was held in a US detention facility for almost three weeks has said she was “naive” to think she would not be affected by Donald Trump’s crack down on immigration.

Rebecca Burke, 28, a graphic artist from Monmouthshire, was trying to go to cross into Canada from the state of Washington when she was refused entry.

She was planning to stay with a host family – where she would carry out domestic chores in exchange for accommodation – and was told she should have applied for a working visa, instead of a tourist visa.

Ms Burke told The Guardian she had not been concerned about leaving the US prior to her 19-day detention.

“I was worried on their (people being detained at the border) behalf – an abstract worry and concern for others – rather than for myself,” she told The Guardian.

“Because, I thought, I’m getting out of here.”

She added: “I was naive to think that what was going on in the world, or at the border, wouldn’t affect me.”

Portland

Ms Burke had previously been staying with a host family in Portland, Oregon, under a similar arrangement after spending some time sightseeing in New York City, where she first arrived from the UK at the start of the year.

Canadian authorities told her to go back to the US and fill in new paperwork before returning to cross into Canada.

However, when she tried to re-enter the US, she was handcuffed and put in a cell before being taken to Tacoma Northwest detention facility in Washington state.

She said: “I heard the door lock, and I instantly threw up.”

Ms Burke said after she arrived at the facility, she was taken to a dorm which she shared with dozens of other women.

Asylum seekers

“Most of them were asylum seekers,” she told The Guardian.

“But there was this handful of new people who had come in recently who did not know why they were here.”

Her father Paul Burke first contacted the Foreign Office in the UK and then decided to go the British press.

Just over a week after widespread media coverage of Ms Burke’s story, she was released.

“I was aware that it was from a major position of privilege that the press listened to this story,” Ms Burke said.

“I was a British tourist, I had these images of my trip on Instagram, and I had contacts with journalists, so I was very lucky. And I wanted the same thing that Ice wanted, which was for me to go home.”

Ms Burke said: “Maybe border security have been pressured to prove they’re stepping up. It did feel like they wanted to get me from the moment I was walked to the American side.”

She has joined her father in warning tourists over plans to visit the US.

Mr Burke previously said: “Even with someone so careful, she was in detention for 19 days.

“If you are going to the US for anything other than a standard holiday, I would write to the US embassy, tell them what visas you think you need and get them to write back to confirm yes or no, and then carry that letter with you.”

Ms Burke warned people not to go at all.

“First, because of the danger of what could happen to you,” she said. “And, secondly, do you really want to give your money to this country right now?”

 


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Fi yn unig
Fi yn unig
28 days ago

I’d like to thank Ms Burke for what she said at the end of this piece which wrote my reply for me. YOU JUST DON’T GO THERE. Trump hates everybody. That includes YOU! Under his authoritarian oppression, you shall not be allowed to proceed in peace. The USA is now a no go area.

Fi yn unig
Fi yn unig
28 days ago

Here’s the payback though. When Farage, Truss and Braverman turn up, incarcerate them. They’re foreigners.

Jeff
Jeff
28 days ago

Top tip. Don’t buy American here possible and don’t go there. Disney is not worth it when you get deported to Venezuela when you are innocent.

RFK is making the place unhealthy, let alone ICE locking you up for no reason other than they are turning into a dictatorship.

Boycott Trumps mess.

Fi yn unig
Fi yn unig
28 days ago
Reply to  Jeff

You’re right. They’re even using the ‘clerical error’ excuse now. If you go there, you could end up anywhere. An exciting mystery trip that could end up in a prison.

Kitty
Kitty
28 days ago

As an American, please don’t come here. Don’t risk it. Protect yourself. Cancel your trips. Make it clear to the hotels and whatever else you’ve booked that you’re canceling because of Trump and politics and personal safety. Make our businesses angry that they are losing business because of this. Boycott American products. Do whatever you can to make us lose money. I’m serious. It’s the only language some people here understand.

Garycymru
Garycymru
27 days ago

I genuinely think that it’s the right time to back away from the US like you’d avoid the nutter in the pub.

Daniel Pitt
Daniel Pitt
27 days ago

Treating foreign visitors like subhuman scum is a brilliant way to destroy your own country’s tourism sector. Way to go, Trump! Soon enough America will be the west’s very own North Korea.

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