World News

In the South? Yes, definitely.

1. The Mexico border is down there. This is worrisome, not because of the Mexicans, but because ICE gangs like to hang out near the border to try and catch runners. A lot of them are tied up in northern cities right now kidnapping citizens but I wouldn't expect them to leave the southern border undefended.

2. It's extremely hot as fuck right now. Further south you go the worse it gets. I'm ~600 miles north of Orlando and it was 109F outside today (that's about 43C) with over 50% humidity. When you pass through my home state of Louisiana you'll be seeing closer to 115F/80%. With heat that high and humidity content that high heat stroke becomes extremely easy. You'll be dealing with this from Florida through around maybe Texas where it starts to become a drier heat, with lower humidity, but places like Arizona used to hit 120F/49C before we were all talking about global warming.

3. Southern Americans (as in, Southerners in the US, not people who live in South America, I know it's confusing) are not all racist, but uh... you'll see more who are, than aren't. If you're any shade of brown you're going to have a rough time. If you speak with a "funny" accent you're going to have a rough time. Armed racists populate huge swathes of the southern and midwestern US. This is statistically more likely to be just upsetting rather than directly harmful in most situations, but I wouldn't want to roll those dice, it's still very possible to find people who would just abduct and kill a foreigner they don't like.

Currently speaking, your biggest problems in the American South right now as a foreign tourist are going to be local racism and ICE. The local racism has been around forever and is mostly tolerable if you don't take offense easily, but you can probably expect to be called some slurs right to your face in more than a few small towns. ICE is a newer and probably bigger problem at the moment. They have orders from the president to capture and deport more people than they will possibly be able to accomplish, so anyone who looks or sounds foreign and doesn't have three forms of ID on them to prove citizenship is increasingly likely to get bagged, tagged, and dragged to a blacksite somewhere. I'm not confident that a tourist visa (or even a work visa) is going to stop them, it's already been proven that actual valid citizenship doesn't stop them.

In general I think they're mostly referring to the fact that the U.S is ridiculously BIG. Like, most visitors freak out at how long you can drive through almost nothing here, when going between major population areas.

Driving through wilderness without a lot of extra water and a cellular connection, and maybe a spare tire, for example, is foolhardy.

Along the way, especially in "The South", you'll find the loveliest, kindest people, but you'll also find various, (probably politically motivated, lately) sadists/racists/bullies, some of which may be small-town law enforcement looking for excitement.

The law can be more "flexible" without major oversight in such places, and with the cult of the orange tyrant emboldening the prejudiced lately, that could spell trouble.

There's also various kinds of unsavory types as you'd find in any other country; I'm talking criminals, swindlers, and various weirdos of ill intent, and some stretches of the country are remote. Like, "no signal and it goes on and on in all directions until you see the earth curve" remote.

The vast majority of people are lovely, and would probably welcome and appreciate foreigners, the worst you'd deal with is getting a migraine from stupid but friendly questions about your accent or where you're from.

But like anywhere else, you need your wits about you.

In short:

Lovely place where many sights and adventures can be had! The biggest dangers are the roads and wilderness, basically.

• Don't mess with wildlife.
• Don't go off exploring remote areas in which you have no business
• Don't underestimate the wilderness and go unprepared.
• Practice the same street smarts as you would anywhere else, like don't go getting into strangers' cars or accepting random open beverages.

Setting aside the anomalous political tensions right now, the biggest danger to travelers to this country is seeing it as a big theme park where they can't possibly put themselves in any danger. Your average park rangers have plenty of horror stories about that, I'm sure, like idiots trying to selfie in front of buffalo or stand on the edge of the Grand Canyon, or falling into Yellowstone's tranquil but literally boiling hot springs...

Don't be that tragic idiot . . .and you'll likely have a fantastic time.

Hope this helps. :)