Comedian told immigration officers may take a dim view of critical comments

The stand-up had planned a trip to New York to launch her book A Passion for Passion: A Delirious Love Letter To Romance on May 5.

However, she has now been left ‘upset and disappointed’ at having to cancel the trip, after an immigration lawyer confirmed her worst fears might be an issue.

Writing on her Patreon page, the comic – who is a regular on The Bugle podcast and has written for Radio 4’s News Quiz – said that her lawyer ‘couldn’t guarantee that having made publicly available jokes that could be considered critical of the administration wouldn’t count in my disfavour in the [visa] application’.

She added that she asked her lawyer:  ‘Obviously this is a silly paranoid question but I do political satire and have a fair few jokes floating around on Elon Musk and Donald Trump’ and whether that  would be a risk.

The lawyer responded that Fraser ‘should be careful’ as it 'depends on the person processing the visa application, and the person who assesses you at the border who has absolute discretion, but they’ll definitely Google you.’

The comedian added: ‘If I didn’t have two children, I might be more open to taking the risk, but the vision of me being there with a baby strapped to me and held up and hassled, or worse, made to turn around and do another 16 hour flight home… means I’m not up for that.’

Her decision comes amid multiple reports of tourists being detained for days or even weeks over alleged visa breaches, and the case of a French scientist denied entry to the States after immigration officials found messages critical of Trump on his phone.

Frasier said the collapse of her publisher Unbound, the restrictions on doing even unpaid promotional work on a  ESTA visa waiver, and the prohibitive $3,000 cost to just apply for a visa that would let her work in the US also contributed to her decision.

Published: 11 Apr 2025