The growth rate of inbound international travel to the U.S. outpaced
that of domestic travel in February, although a drop-off related to President Donald
Trump's visa and immigration policies likely is looming, according to the U.S.
Travel Association.
The organization's Travel Trends Index, based on analysis by
Oxford Economics, indicated that U.S. inbound international travel in February
had its "10th straight month of positive and generally strong
year-over-year growth." Domestic travel, meanwhile, showed weaker growth,
and domestic business travel declined year over year.
While February reflected the first full month since Trump's initial
immigration ban restricting citizens of seven countries from entering the
U.S., the impact of Trump's immigration-related executive orders likely has not
appeared in the index yet, according to USTA SVP for research David Huether. "It's
important to remember that there is a significant lag time between searches for
international trips and when they're actually booked and then another lag
between bookings and the actual trip, typically a matter of months," he
said. "There's a lot of data out there purporting to show a drop in
international travel to the U.S. because of President Trump's executive order,
but the reality is we do not have a definitive picture of the order's impact
yet."
As Trump continues to
fight in court for the travel ban, The Wall Street Journal on Tuesday
reported that the administration also is considering "extreme
vetting" for visa applicants, including longer interviews at embassies and
in some cases requiring them to hand over mobile phones, contacts and social
media passwords for review. These rules could apply even to visitors from
countries participating in the Visa Waiver Program, which includes close U.S.
allies like the U.K., Germany and Japan, according to the report.
Despite
the potential impact of Trump's rhetoric and policies on inbound international
travel, the Travel Trends Index projects that total U.S. travel volume for the
first eight months of 2017 will grow 1.6 percent year over year.