alt Hacker News> My point was that Polish citizens do not get asked. This is different for Americans. US citizens entering their own country have to answer these bizarre and sometimes creepy questions.
It's not like I kept a list or anything, but as an American, I don't think I've ever been asked questions like "Where are you going? Where will you be staying? What do you intend to do?" by border control when returning to the US.
I distinctly recall having been asked questions about where I'm coming from, like "Do you have any X"? (where X is legal and common in a country I visited, but illegal in the US).
Replies
They're on the lookout for criminal activity. I transited lower Ontario with empty containers for a completed move between states. That can look like smuggling to the guards and you get more probing questions.
I am a US citizen who has left the States a small handful of times. I received probing questions twice while crossing the USA-CAN border (which I have crossed ~6 times), once where the agent got angry with me because apparently I wasn't answering/following her directions well enough, and the other time the agent seemed to just be following a protocol. The only other time I was questioned was on my way to Iran, but everyone was getting questioned. That flight was delayed by over 3 hours too.
I do not look like an immigrant or other marginalized group that stereotypically gets extra attention at borders. I know the difference, because my (American) brother-in-law gets 'randomly selected' everywhere for the misfortune of having Arabic ancestry.