What A Day - Why Is CBP Detaining American Citizens?

Episode Date: August 25, 2026

We’ve all seen how Customs and Border Protection has run roughshod over the civil rights of immigrants both legal and undocumented alike across the country. But if you’re an American citizen, you might not think that these abuses could ever happen to you. In fact, maybe the only time you’ve ever even seen Border Protection agents has been at the airport. And yet, that’s where journalist Matthew Petti got detained for hours by Border agents. Now he’s trying to figure out what happened and how to make sure it doesn’t happen to anyone else. We spoke with Matthew about his experience with CBP and your rights as an American at the airport.And in headlines, Canada announced retaliatory tariffs on about $20 billion worth of American goods, two people in Pennsylvania have died from measles, and a federal judge rejected Ghislaine Maxwell’s bid for prison release.Show Notes: Check out Matthew's story – tinyurl.com/bdz6cj4d Call Congress – 202-224-3121 Subscribe to the What A Day Newsletter – https://tinyurl.com/y4y2e9jy What A Day – YouTube – https://www.youtube.com/@whatadaypodcast Follow us on Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/crookedmedia/ For a transcript of this episode, please email [e-mail]

Around hour three of this, I just go up to the reception desk and I say, I need to use your phone. They were a little bit confused, like our phone. I said, yeah, I need to speak to my lawyer. They said, you can't do that. I said, well, I'm an American. You can't just detain me indefinitely. And they said a line that I think is pretty crazy. It's not indefinite.

We'll let you know. Just like, all right, so it's indefinite for me. It's not indefinite for you. It's indefinite for me. I'm Jane Koston, and this is what a day. The show is saying goodbye to the great Dolly Parton. The absolute legend and icon of music and movies passed away today at the age of 80, which seems impossible because how could Dolly Parton ever possibly die?

In lieu of flowers, the family is asking donations to be made to Dolly's imagination library, which is gifted over 330 million books to children around the world, because when Dolly Parton put her mind to it, she could do pretty much anything. On today's show, we talk about customs and border protection, and the risks even American citizens face from Trump's immigration regime with Reason Magazine's Matthew Petty. Before we get into that, Kafka-esque nightmare, here's what we're following today, Tuesday, August 25th.

Today I'm announcing that Canada will match the United States tariffs, dollar for dollar, rate for rate. Effective September 8, Canada will impose counter tariffs of up to 15, 25, or 50 percent on top. 27.6 billion in imports from the United States of America. And the trade war continues. Canada's finance minister announced, with good reason, retaliatory tariffs on about $20 billion worth of American goods today.

That includes steel, dairy products, appliances, and farm equipment. Am I surprised? No, because we started this fight. Our neighbors to the north are merely striking back after the Trump administration imposed 50% tariffs on Canadian goods over the weekend. This is what happens when we let a power-hungry orange narcissist take over trade negotiations. And is President Donald Trump trying to smooth things over? Of course not.

Instead, he's pouring fuel on the fire in a spat with Ontario Premier Doug Ford. Trump, clearly trying to poke the bear, wrote on true social that the U.S. is giving, quote, serious considerations to renaming Lake Ontario, Lake America. We are so sorry, Canada. Forgive us, say? Two Pennsylvania residents have died from measles, state health officials said today. They're the first measles-related deaths in the U.S. this year. Pennsylvania Democratic Governor Josh Shapiro said during a press conference that both individuals were unvaccinated and from Lancaster County.

I want to be clear. This illness and death from measles is completely preventable. We already have the tools to protect ourselves and our families from this disease, which is one of the most contagious diseases on the face of the earth. The U.S. is enduring its worst year for measles since 1991. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, there have been over 2,700 cases so far this year. Galane Maxwell, Jeffrey Epstein's former girlfriend and associate, will be staying in prison. That's after a federal judge rejected her effort to get her 20-year sentence for sex trafficking set aside today. Maxwell was convicted of participating in Epstein's repeated sexual abuse of minors back in 2021, but she filed a habeas petition last year as a last

stitch attempt to get out of her prison sentence, in which she argued that exculpatory evidence was withheld during her trial. In his finding, Judge Paul Engelmeyer found that Maxwell's claims were, quote, all meritless and all, or almost all, are frivolous. He added, quote, the overwhelming testimonial and documentary evidence adduced at trial conclusively established her guilt, and her petition's claims are demonstrably meritless, and generally based on speculation, distortion, and or outright falsehoods. Finally, some good news. Georgia and South Carolina both have runoffs today,

and the name of this game is nepotism. In Georgia, residents of the state's 13th congressional district will get a new representative to Congress and a special election runoff to replace the late Democratic U.S. representative, David Scott. Scott died in April. The finalist for the seat are former Gwinnett County School Board Chair, Everton Blair, and Marcy Scott, daughter of the late congressman. The winner will serve out the remaining few months of David Scott's term.

Neither candidate is running for the next full term in this seat. And in South Carolina, U.S. Senator Darlene Graham and U.S. Representative Ralph Norman are facing voters yet again in a special Republican primary runoff. They're competing to replace the late Lindsay Graham in the Senate, one month after his son death. As we know, Darlene is Graham's sister. Let's see if those 50 million people in South Carolina will vote to keep Graham in the Senate. What was that? Oh, sorry.

I meant 5 million. And that's the news. Let's talk about CBP. We've seen how Customs and Border Protection, or CBP, has run roughshod over the civil rights of immigrants, both legal and undocumented alike, across the country. But if you're an American citizen, you might not think that these abuses could ever happen to you. Sure, you've seen what happened to Americans who confronted Homeland Security Forces in Minneapolis and Los Angeles. But maybe you've never even been to one of those cities. In fact, maybe the only time you've ever even seen border protection agents is at the airport.

And yet, that's where Matthew Petty got detained for hours by border agents, and he still doesn't know why. Petty is a journalist and an American citizen. Two weeks ago, he was returning to New Jersey from a trip overseas when he was stopped and held in the airport without access to an attorney. Now he's trying to figure out what happened and how to make sure it doesn't happen to anyone else. I spoke to Matthew about his experience with CBP and what he wants you to know about your rights at the airport. airport. Matt, welcome to Wadda. Thanks for having me on. So let me just start with the basics. Earlier this year, you were detained by a CBP at the airport returning home from an overseas trip. What happened? Right. Well, that's a good question because I'm still kind of trying to make sense of it.

I had been doing a lot of things abroad. I had been studying, getting my master's degree, got married to someone who lives outside the U.S. Congratulations. Thank you. You can see. Starting our new home, et cetera, et cetera. And then we're like, we're going to go visit, you know, my family, her in-laws for the first time. Now we're finally settled in.

It's the summer. She's off from her PhD. We fly in. And I was like a little bit nervous. Funny thing, I was the paranoid one. She was like, oh, nothing's going to happen. And like, you don't know under this administration. They've turned away a lot of people with valid tourist fees.

is invalid reasons to be here. We go up to the passport control. They actually stamp my wife through, and then they tell me, we need him. They point at me, and they say we need him. They put my passport in like this weird orange sleeve and tell me that I have to go down this long corridor to what they call the secondary inspection room.

They seat me in a waiting room and won't answer any questions. are just like, your turn is coming, your turn is coming, your turn is coming. Around hour three of this, I just go up to the reception desk and I say, I need to use your phone. They were a little bit confused, like our phone. I said, yeah, I need to speak to my lawyer. They said, you can't do that. I said, well, I'm an American.

You can't just detain me indefinitely. And they said a line that I think is pretty crazy. It's not indefinite. We'll let you know. Just like, all right, so it's indefinite for me. It's not indefinite for you. It's indefinite for me. But then I think that might have spooked them or something because about 10 minutes later, I get called up to pass the reception desk to another desk where they asked me basically the exact same questions that you get just at regular passport control, which is like, where are you coming from? How long were you out of the country? And then they didn't search my bags. They didn't do anything to just let me go. And this is the second time I've had this experience.

but it's never been this unsettling long or... Yeah, I wanted to ask, you mentioned that this has happened to you before back in 2023 under the Biden administration. How did the two experiences differ? The first experience made a lot of sense because I wasn't a known journalist. I was traveling alone after a long study abroad in the Middle East. And so they basically said, oh, you have to answer a few more questions. They take me to a similar waiting room, but instead of it being three hours, it was

was like 10 minutes of waiting. They called me to a desk. They asked me a lot of questions. Some of them, I think, were intrusive and inappropriate. They were like, where in the Middle East did you travel? Do you have any family in those countries? Oh, you're studying journalism. What kind of journalism? Which I think is like, they shouldn't be asking that. But, you know, it was a very professional, quick and straightforward encounter. Like, I understood why they, what they wanted to know, what I was doing. And then they, they were. They let me go very quickly within half an hour. This time, I think it was more unsettling because they never asked me any questions.

It's just sort of some kind of weird harassment or something of just you're a journalist, so we're going to. But even that part is not clear. Is it the journalist? Is it the travel history? And I think part of what makes the border exemption to having rights in America so unsettling is you don't know, right? You don't know if you're on a list.

You don't know what you're doing. that is, like, there's no way to know if you're doing the right thing or the wrong thing that will cause you this inconvenience. And then once you're being held, you, even though the court says, you know, they can't hold you like indefinitely or unreasonably, there's no definition of that. They could have held me for a whole day if they wanted to. And, like, to be completely blunt about this, I decided to write about the experience because I think people should assert their rights and, you know, talk about their experiences. But I've heard. far worse things happening to other people, I got off pretty easy.

Yes, we've gotten to the point where an American citizen being held at the airport for four hours for no reason is getting off easy. That's where we are. If that's something you're against, stay tuned. We'll have more of my conversation with Matthew Puddy in a moment. In the meantime, make sure to subscribe, leave a five-star review on Spotify and Apple Podcasts, watch us on YouTube and share with your friends. More to come after some ads. What a day is brought to you by Nutraful. summer is full of vacations, weekend getaways, and spending more time outdoors, and when you're packing for a trip, the last thing you want is to be worrying about your hair. Nutrafol is the number one dermatologist-recommendor-recommend recommended hair-growth supplement brand, and it's the number one hair-growth supplement brand personally used by dermatologists. Nutraful's hair growth supplements are peer-reviewed, NSF certified for sport, and clinically tested.

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at joinbilt.com slash Wad. That's J-O-I-N-B-I-L-T-com slash Wad. Use our links to the new we sent you. Let's get back to my conversation with Matthew Petty. The thing that got me about your story is that you got stopped and you have no idea why. You've written for a host of outlets, but many of them, including the American conservative or the critic in the UK, they lean more conservative. But you seem to, and I say seem to very purposely, you seem to have wound up on a government watch list anyway.

Maybe. Can you tell me more about what you've been learning about how the government is keeping an eye on journalists? Again, maybe, because it's so unclear as to what's going on here. Right. I've written for right-wing publications, but as someone who's very critical of the U.S. foreign policy, the U.S. relationship with Israel, but it could also be travel history, but it could also be nothing. What I have learned is that both under the First and Second Trump administration, they have kept secret watch lists. There's still no way to know if you're on it. They will let you file a complaint if you think you're on it, and they might take you off it or they might not. But there's an addition to these known lists, there are also secret lists, maintain. by the Department of Homeland Security that have sort of just come out in leaks and stuff. There was a few months ago, an immigration lawyer

sort of accidentally found a document while trying to log into a client visitation portal that was said watch list and had their name on it and along with a bunch of other lawyers. Recently, we covered at Reason Magazine, they're moving towards more AI in making these watch lists. So it might even be out of the control of a human being, and the human being might not even know why this person's been listed.

And I think it's a combination, right, of just the immigration system bipartisanly being a very Kafkaesque, arbitrary, dictatorial thing where you have no rights. But on the other hand, the Trump administration, I think in particular, has decided to use these kinds of administrative powers to go after people who are critical of the administration or just sort of belong to undesirable social groups. I want to go back to something that was really important that also struck me about your experience. And I'm glad you mentioned other journalists have been held by CBP at the airport. This has happened worse to others.

But you were told that you couldn't call a lawyer. Why? So this is a very interesting thing because I actually did what most people don't do. And I sort of called up the CVP spokesman office. And I'm like, hi, I'm going to write about my experience. And I think that spook them a little bit. more forthcoming, although I never got a straight answer about why I was being held. And I know they looked at my case file because they gave me specific details, but not why. But one of the things

they claimed was that you don't have a right to a lawyer as long as you're being administratively processed. So it's a sort of you're not being accused of a crime. Therefore, you have less rights. I would have a right to a lawyer if they said, oh, we found contraband and we're going to take you in for that. But if they're just detaining me in order to ask me questions that might be intrusive, might be incriminating, their position is, oh, no, but this is just a normal travel procedure. So therefore, you can't talk to a lawyer. But you wouldn't be able to just leave. No, exactly. With the caveat that, again, you're an American citizen, if you're a foreigner, it's really unfortunate. You really don't have rights. If you're an American citizen, they can't

stop you from coming back in your own country. So you can just say, I'm not answering any of those questions. You can't physically resist a search, but you can say, no, I can't tell you that information. I don't want to talk to you. And then eventually, however many hours later, they have to let you in. But their position is during this whole process in which you are being, you are not free to leave, you are being investigated, but you're not accused of a crime. Therefore, you have no right to contact a lawyer or anyone else. You filed a Freedom of Information Act request to get more information about why you were held because you don't know. And it seems kind of like they don't know either.

What are you hoping to learn? Well, I'm hoping to learn if I exist on any of these lists, then they'll either have to give it to me or they'll have to, you know, give me the sort of redacted document that says we don't want to tell you that you're on a list. I'm also hoping to sort of learn the entire sort of like what someone's file with Customs and Board. border protection looks like, right? Because these, it's, I don't think these documents have ever been made public, like what shows up on the border agent's screen. And I think that can also lead the way to more FOIA requests and give other people the ability to ask for this. So I sort of had this kitchen sink language where I copied like every single, the name of every single known watch list. I said any notes they have, basically just like anything they have with my name in it. And of course,

that's going to take a while and it's probably going to require a little bit back and forth with the agency. But once you know the name of a specific document, what it looks like, then it becomes much easier for other people to say, I want that specific document. And they can't say your request is vague or it'll take a long time. It becomes much easier to ask for that kind of thing. Why was it important for you to share your story, to talk to me, to keep following up with DHS, with CBP? Why did it matter? Well, I think. one of the things is that, as I've been saying, part of the arbitrary power they have is that they hold all the cards in terms of information and no one else knows what's going to happen. And it's part

of it is like isolating you and making it a solitary experience. So I think just by having more people talk about it openly, you can sort of even the playing field. I think also because I'm an American citizen, first of all, which is American password is huge privilege to have, especially when dealing with the US government. And I'm someone with a platform and access to media. I think it's sort of a duty to exercise with power you have so that this doesn't happen to other people. And I think, again, it's particularly important also to not let them get away with

hassling journalists. I noticed actually when I've talked to other journalists who've had bad experience at the border, they didn't understand or just people who worked in similar fields. They didn't understand that they border protection. couldn't turn you back from the country. So they gave up more information than they were ever obliged to give. And I don't think that's right. I think you should know your rights, which again, in the case, I know I keep beating this

like a drum, because I think it's very important people walk away with this knowledge. In the case of an American citizen, the only information they need is that you're a citizen with a right to enter the country. Matthew, thank you so much for taking the time to join me. Thank you so much for having me. That was my conversation with Matthew Petty, Assistant Editor. at Reason Magazine. Before we go, at Crooked, we believe the answer to right-wing authoritarianism is a big, fun, pro-democracy movement. And that's why CrookedCon, it's back. Join us in D.C.

from November 5th through 7th for three days of live shows, panels, candidate forums, and maybe a drink or two. We cannot wait to see you there. Head to Crookedcon.com for tickets, lineup announcements, and more. That's all for today. If you like the show, make sure you subscribe, leave a review. never forget that Dolly Parton was a brilliant woman and tell your friends to listen. And if you're into reading, not just about how back in 1978 ABC News as Barbara Walters tried to shame Dolly Parton,

but it absolutely did not work. You don't have to look like this. You're very beautiful. You don't have to wear the blonde wigs. You don't have to wear the extreme clothes, right? No, it's certainly a choice. I don't like to be like everybody else. I've often made this statement

that I would never stoop so low as to be fashionable. That's the easiest thing in the world. to do. So I just decided that I would do something that would at least get the attention. Once they got past the shock of the ridiculous way I looked and all that, then they would see there was parts of me to be appreciated. Like me, What Today is also a nightly newsletter. Check it out and subscribe at crooked.com slash subscribe. I'm Jane Koston, and what an absolute legend we have lost. What a Day is a production of Crooked Media. Our show is produced by Caitlin Plummer, Emily Forre, Erica Morrison, and Adrian Hill. Our team includes Haley Jones,

Greg Walters, Matt Berg, Joseph Dutra, Johanna Case, and Desmond Taylor. Our music is by Kyle Murdoch and Jordan Cantor. We had helped today from the Associated Press. Our production staff is proudly unionized with the Writers Guild of America East.