How Voting Impacts Travel

Plus Çig Köfte and lots of links

Oct 29, 2020

Hello from Chicago!

Moved back over the weekend and even though we’re about to go through winter in a pandemic I still couldn’t be happier to be here.

Lots of you are new–thank you for signing up! I think all the signups are due to this piece I wrote a couple of years ago about Airbnb, which made the rounds again recently on news aggregators. Find out what the newsletter is all about here.

Be a Better Traveler –– Voting Edition

When it comes to travel, Americans have had a pretty easy time of it. Our passport was long one of the most powerful in the world, gaining us easy, visa-free travel to dozens of countries, visa-on-arrival travel to dozens more. American passport holders breezed through security checkpoints and in many ways got special treatment thanks to the USD we spent liberally while traveling.

That’s changing. Our passport dropped to #7 on the 2020 Henley Passport Index, and to #22 on PassportIndex.org. Even more notable, American travelers were not on the European Union’s list of approved countries to enter this summer.

A recent PEW poll found the image of the United States has dropped drastically over the last year. “ Just 41% in the United Kingdom express a favorable opinion of the U.S., the lowest percentage registered in any Pew Research Center survey there. In France, only 31% see the U.S. positively, matching the grim ratings from March 2003, at the height of U.S.-France tensions over the Iraq War. Germans give the U.S. particularly low marks on the survey: 26% rate the U.S. favorably, similar to the 25% in the same March 2003 poll.”

Luckily, there’s an election in less than two weeks, and we have the power to get our travel abilities and reputation back on track. Here’s how voting affects your ability to travel:

COVID-19. Americans living in the U.S. can’t go anywhere until the pandemic is under control. (Well, technically they can go a few places, but the ethics are debatable). That is not the case for much of the rest of the world. The United States’ horrific handling of the coronavirus is the main reason the passport ranking fell, and the only reason the EU banned American travelers. One candidate listens to scientists and doctors, one mocks them. One decided not to join a global vaccine effort, one is for it. Your vote.
American foreign policy dictates where we can travel post-covid. Visiting Cuba, for example, becomes easier or much more difficult depending on who is in power. Visiting somewhere like Russia or Saudi Arabia or China or Turkey becomes either more or less dangerous, depending on our relations with those countries. Whether the U.S. intervenes or provides aid to places, or chooses not to, can make countries safer or more dangerous for tourists from anywhere. (That last one is especially complicated. Maybe we can dive in in a future newsletter). Americans living in the UAE can now travel directly to Israel, and not have to worry about stamps from either one. Americans can visit Saudi Arabia today with a tourist visa, but are less likely to get tourist visas to Iran than when the Nuclear Deal was in effect. Beginning in 2021, all U.S. passport holders traveling to Schengen countries in Europe will need authorization, a major change. All of this is part of U.S. foreign policy and depends on who is president.
Foreign policy also affects travel costs. We enjoy visa-free travel to 116 countries and visa-on-arrival in 38 countries. About 50 countries require advance visas. Advance visas and visa-on-arrival cost money, and how much money typically depends on how the U.S. treats visitors from those countries. In recent years, more countries have upped their fees in reciprocation to fees or restrictions placed on their citizens entering the U.S. Domestically, when the economy is doing well, your dollars go further.
This one can’t be quantified, but Americans are treated differently abroad based on our president. Personally, this bugs me. Would I treat someone visiting the U.S. differently based on who their president is? No. Then again, our government does involve itself in other countries often, so to a point I get it. When I first started traveling, at 21, it was fashionable to make fun of Americans as loud, ignorant, uncultured. Over eight years of Obama, that faded. Not completely, and there were those who didn’t like him, but there was a definite shift in how we were perceived. Now, it’s a disaster. I’ve talked about Trump so much more than I ever want to talk about him, because people in other countries are appalled and confused about how he was elected and how he still has support. I am so sick of explaining the electoral college, and of defending the majority of the country that does not agree with his harmful and often insane beliefs. The U.S. is a huge, diverse place, and to truly understand it requires a level of nuance and information and time spent in the country that many will never experience (partly because of our visa laws–see below). Whether we like it or not, how we are perceived as people is often based on headlines and the actions of our president. I prefer a president who is at the very least a decent human being capable of logical thinking.
The election results not only affect how and where Americans can travel, but also who can visit us! The “Muslim Travel Ban” blocked citizens of seven countries from visiting, even to see their families. As mentioned before, the current administration has enacted more visa restrictions and shortened visas for numerous countries, including France. There’s a literal wall being built on the U.S.-Mexico border. There are so many things I want my friends around the world to see in the United States. Our national parks! Our diverse cities with some of the best food in the world! The Great Lakes! Chicago Architecture! New Orleans as a whole! It’s so sad and frustrating that many of them cannot get visas to visit.

There are many reasons this election matters, and many more important than travel. But just in case affordable healthcare, same-sex marriage, women making decisions about their own body, the health of the planet, the economy recovering, 545 children separated from their parents, or more than 222,000 coronavirus deaths and tens of thousands more expected haven’t already made the choice for you, vote for your ability to travel more often, more widely, freer, and without scorn.

Travel Links

As plantations talk more honestly about slavery, some visitors are pushing back

Venice Sea Walls Withstand First Test: Video

An Outdoor Getaway on Turkey’s Black Sea Coast (Disclosure: I wrote this one)

Travel for the Food

Right now, we’re probably not traveling much for the food, but journalists are still traveling to diners (this is a fascinating story) and I’m traveling here in my mind.