JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
There was a sharp drop in the number of European tourists visiting the U.S. last year compared to 2024. Many said the volatile political climate was the reason. Frightening stories of Europeans getting caught in the Trump administration's reinforced border controls have also dampened desires to cross the Atlantic. NPR's Eleanor Beardsley brings us one French person's experience.
(SOUNDBITE OF DOOR OPENING)
ELEANOR BEARDSLEY, BYLINE: Bonjour.
JULIEN PEREIRA: How are you doing? Bonjour.
BEARDSLEY: I'm fine. How are you? Come in.
PEREIRA: Very good. Thank you.
BEARDSLEY: Thank you for coming.
PEREIRA: No, thank you for welcoming me.
BEARDSLEY: Twenty-six-year-old Julien Pereira agrees to come to my apartment to tell me his story. With a warm smile and polite manners, he's the kind of young man any parent would be proud of.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
PEREIRA: (Grunting).
(SOUNDBITE OF TENNIS RACKET SMACKING)
BEARDSLEY: Pereira played four years of varsity tennis at a Christian college in Georgia. He shows me videos. During the summers, he was a tennis coach at a club in Connecticut, his American dream come true.
PEREIRA: I love the U.S., you know? That country gave me a chance to work, to study. I became a man over there. Like, I came at 17, you know? I felt like I was a kid, and then I grew up.
BEARDSLEY: After graduation, he accepted a permanent job with the tennis club. But there were unforeseen delays getting his work visa. The plan was for him to stay for a couple of weeks in Canada while the paperwork was being done. But he was denied entry to Canada with his expired student visa and arrested by U.S. Border Patrol.
PEREIRA: Yeah, I was in shock. I was like, guys, like, I'm really trying to do the right thing. I always made sure, like, I was legal in the country.
BEARDSLEY: This apolitical youngster says he had no problem handing over his devices and passwords. He had nothing to hide. But he wasn't even allowed to call his parents initially. Border Patrol told him foreigners do not have the same rights. After a few days in detention, Pereira was handed over to ICE.
PEREIRA: They started handcuffing me. They put chains around my hip. They put handcuffs on my feet. I tried to stay calm, but it's tough to stay, you know, focused, calm. You're stressed.
BEARDSLEY: Pereira was sent to a barbed wire-enclosed ICE facility in Batavia, New York, crammed into a unit with 80 other men.
PEREIRA: They take everything off you. And they put you in, you know, the jail dress, I guess. I don't know how to call that in English.
BEARDSLEY: He says most of the men were from Central and South America, though there were a few Russians, Chinese and Africans. One day, they were told they were being transferred. They were woken at 3 a.m. They spent the next 24 hours in shackles. Some transferred to Texas, others to California. Officials ignored their pleas for water.
PEREIRA: We have no water. We haven't drunk water in a while. And they just put the music as loud as possible, almost, like, making fun of us. We're not asking you to be nice, just have some human compassion or something. I don't know. We're not animals.
BEARDSLEY: NPR contacted ICE for their version of events and did not get a response.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
PEREIRA: (Speaking French).
BEARDSLEY: Pereira has been recounting his tale on French TV news shows like this one, as footage of violent ICE arrests in Minneapolis plays on a split screen.
PEREIRA: You're just starving in there. Like, I lost seven kilos. I'm dirty. I cannot sleep, really. I'm cold in there.
BEARDSLEY: He says it felt like they were trying to break you mentally, so you would give up on your case. After a month of detention and three hearings before a judge, Pereira was eventually released on $5,000 bail. He was ashamed of the ankle bracelet he had to wear. A judge gave him 15 days to leave his seven-year American life behind. But he knows he was lucky.
PEREIRA: I don't have a family in the U.S. I don't have kids. I don't have a business, so I could very easily leave.
BEARDSLEY: He says many of the men he was with were ripped from families and deep-rooted lives. He believes the U.S. is losing credibility around the world.
Eleanor Beardsley, NPR News, Paris.
(SOUNDBITE OF I.AM.TRU.STARR SONG, "(ETC.)") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.
