Now I’m not talking about smuggling anything illegal, I aim to keep my activities on this side of the border strictly legal. Not out of love for cops but as a defence against them harassing me. I’m thinking about things like “helping” Americans pay only $2000 for an iphone instead of $3000, that sort of thing. Any pointers, tips, ideas?
You are severely underestimating how shitty CBP is lol. I’ve had a few especially shitty border cops over the years question shit like basic tools I had in the trunk of my car. I had friend who ran conferences, on a trip down for personal stuff he brought a pretty standard DSLR and a tripod to shoot an interview with someone who was gonna be at one of these conferences while he was there anyway. He didn’t admit that and just said it was for taking pics of the trip, but they didn’t believe him and said that he was smuggling in equipment to do work in the country, and detained him for like 4-5 hours, during which they scoured social media and found a youtube page for the conference stuff. They didn’t have any proof but that didn’t matter because they have a right to refuse entry, turned him around and banned him from the country for something like 3-5 years?
touché