At the gates of the , the United States has set its sights on the influencers foreigners. Immigration authorities have warned that those who enter the country with a tourist visa cannot use their stay to produce content intended to generate economic income on YouTube, TikTok, Facebook or other platforms, a practice that for years has been common among digital creators around the world.
The message comes at a critical moment: on the eve of one of the most important sporting events on the planet, which will attract hundreds of influencers willing to document the experience for millions of followers. It is unclear what the impact of these new restrictions announced by the Donald Trump Administration would be. To date it is unknown if they have already applied them.
“Having as the sole purpose of the visit, thus generating earnings from the United States while in the country, is considered work and requires the corresponding visa,” says a joint statement from the Customs and Border Protection Office and the US Department of Homeland Security sent to EL PAÍS. “Individuals who enter the United States under a visitor program and receive income from a US source would be violating the conditions of their admission status,” the statement added.
The tourist visa (B-2) allows entry to the United States for reasons of leisure, vacations, family visits or medical treatments, but prohibits carrying out work activities or receiving income derived from work carried out in United States territory. Nor does it authorize staying beyond the time granted by the authorities. Failure to comply with these conditions may result in deportation and restrictions on future travel to the country.
For content creators, one of the alternatives is the O-1 visa, intended for people with extraordinary abilities in areas such as arts, business, science or sports. This visa allows, under certain conditions, to carry out paid professional activities, including collaborations with brands, promotional tours and the production of content for commercial purposes.
A government source assured EL PAÍS that the Trump Administration plans to tighten inspections at airports and border checkpoints on influencers Mexicans and other countries who use a tourist visa to “work” and generate large profits. The source, who requested anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly, said the goal is “to protect American jobs.”
“Their own videos give them away,” he said. The reference points to dozens of foreign creators who have even documented how they obtained a visa at a US embassy and then traveled to different cities in this country to record content for their YouTube channels and digital platforms.
This activity is capable of generating million-dollar income and some influencers They have larger audiences than traditional media, thanks to the rise of platforms such as YouTube and TikTok. The most popular ones earn additional profits through advertising, sponsorships, agreements with brands and by supporting political campaigns.
Meta, which owns Instagram and Facebook, as well as YouTube and TikTok, did not respond to requests for comment on the new measures announced.
The FIFA World Cup promises to become one of the digital phenomena of the year and represents a golden opportunity for digital creators. of the tournament, distributed among venues such as Los Angeles, New York, Miami, Dallas, Houston, Seattle, Atlanta and San Francisco.
Los influencers expelled
The alarms went off in the Trump Administration, according to the source consulted by this medium, after , one of the biggest TikTok stars and one of the most followed digital creators in the world, with more than 160 million followers on the platform. He influencer Senegalese-Italian was arrested in Las Vegas, Nevada, in June 2025 for remaining in the United States after the authorized period of his visa had expired. He was later released and voluntarily left the country to avoid a formal deportation order, a sanction that would have prevented him from returning for several years. Lame, 26, during the pandemic thanks to his silent videos and his characteristic facial expressions.
Another case that attracted the attention of the authorities was that of Venezuelan Leonel Moreno, known on social networks as the “influencer migrant.” The young man found himself in the government’s crosshairs after posting videos on TikTok in which he allegedly encouraged illegal behavior, such as squatting in abandoned homes and taking advantage of public assistance programs. Moreno had an open asylum case, but stopped showing up for mandatory supervision appointments with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). “I didn’t cross the Rio Grande to work like a slave,” he said in one of his videos, while displaying $100 bills that, according to him, came from from government aid programs. Authorities deported him in March 2025.
For Vance Owen, a lawyer specializing in the entertainment industry in Los Angeles, these immigration measures still leave questions about their scope and application. At the end of the day, what worries the Government is tax evasion, considers the litigant. “Technology advances faster than the laws and perhaps we are seeing a situation in which the tax laws, the federal laws, are adapting to this new situation of the influencers because they did not exist before the internet. It’s new and some tax laws are 100 years old or more. “We are seeing a clash between technology and old laws.”
Owen is concerned about how these new regulations would be applied, since he considers the internet to be a free field. “How can a country rein in a business that is global? I have more questions than answers,” he says.
The lawyer believes that there may be exceptions if, for example, a tourist records a video in New Orleans that goes viral and thus begins to gain millions of followers on social networks. “It would not violate the law because it came in good faith, it was not influencer and his fame was born out of nowhere,” he explains. “I think they’re trying to fit something old into something new and sometimes that shoe doesn’t fit that foot.”
