What every meeting and event planner needs to know about a proposed federal crackdown on international flight processing.

The meeting and events industry has navigated pandemics, geopolitical crises and extreme weather. Now a new category of disruption is taking shape — one rooted in domestic immigration politics, with potentially immediate consequences for events scheduled in some of the country’s most popular meeting destinations.

In late May 2026, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin announced on Fox News that his department is “drawing up plans” to halt Customs and Border Protection processing at international airports in so-called sanctuary cities — jurisdictions where local governments limit cooperation with federal immigration enforcement. The mechanism is subtle but could be devastating if put into practice: Rather than canceling flights outright, the administration would simply reassign CBP officers away from those airports, making it legally impossible to process arriving international passengers.

While this is a developing situation —as of this writing the White House has not endorsed the proposal — meeting planners should start planning for the possibility this elevated-risk scenario could come to pass if they have upcoming meetings in potentially at-risk destinations.

What’s actually being proposed

The Department of Justice released a list of “sanctuary jurisdictions” in October 2025 that included Democrat-led cities like New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, Boston, Newark, Philadelphia, Seattle and San Francisco. Many of those cities operate some of the busiest international airports in the country — JFK, LAX, O’Hare, Logan, SFO and Newark Liberty among them.

Mullin’s rationale, stated plainly: “They don’t want us to enforce immigration, but they want us to process immigration at their facilities.” Fact-checkers note that no flights would technically be “banned” — but if CBP staffing is removed, airlines cannot legally operate international arrivals into those airports. The effect is functionally identical.

Not everyone in the Cabinet agrees: At least one fellow Cabinet member has come out against the proposal, and the White House press office has not confirmed support. Courts have also been an active check on related immigration enforcement tactics, with a federal judge previously blocking attempts to withhold funding from sanctuary cities. Legal challenges to any airport processing halt would be immediate and substantial.

FIFA World Cup as a real-world stress test

The best available model for understanding how this could play out at scale is the 2026 FIFA World Cup, kicking off in mid-June across 11 U.S. host cities — nearly all of which are on the sanctuary jurisdiction list.

The National Immigration Forum estimates that roughly 1.24 million international visitors will travel to the U.S. specifically for the tournament, with more than five million fans expected to attend matches across the three host countries. Travel industry leaders are warning that any withdrawal of CBP officers from major gateway airports could create severe disruptions to international travel, economic losses, and lasting damage to America’s global reputation — precisely as the country is trying to welcome the world.

The institutional response from host committees has been instructive. The New York/New Jersey Host Committee has issued assurances that federal agency presence at venues is tied to security operations, not immigration enforcement. Los Angeles’s World Cup Host Committee stated there is “no indication that ICE will be deployed”” at SoFi Stadium or the LA Memorial Coliseum. Yet Mullin stated in a CBS News interview that immigration arrests at matches aren’t off the table, even while saying there would be no mass roundups.

Amnesty International USA has issued a formal travel advisory for World Cup visitors, citing disproportionate risks for people from immigrant communities, racial and ethnic minority groups, and LGBTQ+ individuals. This is the environment in which your international attendees are making decisions about whether to travel.

Six implications for Business meetings and events

Airport entry is the chokepoint, not the venue. Your conference center is fine. The risk is that international delegates simply cannot clear customs. Even hours-long processing delays or entry refusals — without any mass enforcement action — can devastate attendance at an event with significant international rosters.

The chilling effect is already being felt. International attendees, especially those from countries with strained U.S. relations or from immigrant communities, may decline invitations or have employers advise against travel. This behavioral shift doesn’t wait for policy enactment.

Destination city now carries immigration-risk weight. A conference in Nashville or Dallas currently carries materially different entry-risk optics than the same event in Chicago or San Francisco — regardless of what happens on the ground. City selection decisions need an immigration-risk layer added to the standard site-selection scorecard.

Hybrid and remote fallback is no longer optional. Events with meaningful international attendance should have a fully functional virtual participation track planned and tested before contract signing so they don’t have to retrofit should a crisis arise.

Communicate proactively with international guests. Don’t wait for attendees to ask. Brief international registrants on the current situation, what entry procedures apply to their nationality, and what contingency options exist if they encounter processing issues.

Consider alternate gateways or co-locations. For events with heavy international rosters, evaluate whether Canadian co-locations (Toronto, Vancouver) or routing through airports not on the sanctuary list offer meaningful risk mitigation. This is especially relevant for events scheduled in the second half of 2026 and 2027, when the political environment may still be unsettled.

What to watch

The FIFA World Cup — running June through July 2026 across affected cities — will be the first major real-world test of how this situation actually plays out. Travel industry groups including Airlines for America have formally warned against CBP staffing reductions, and legal challenges are likely if the plan moves forward. Monitor FIFA’s entry experience closely: Long lines, traveler detentions or publicized enforcement incidents at World Cup airports will set the default expectation for international meeting planners evaluating a U.S. city for the next several years.

Snopes and other fact-checkers continue to monitor the situation, and any formal policy announcement would require logistical lead time. The meetings industry likely has a window to prepare — but that window is narrowing.