An article in the USA today states that “For most foreigners, taking a last-minute business or leisure trip to New York, Los Angeles, Miami or other U.S. travel hubs would be nearly impossible. The average wait time for a visa interview in Rio de Janeiro, for example, was 87 days, according to the State Department.”
In a perfect world, visa interview wait times should not be more than a week, travelers would not overstay their visas and terrorists would not apply for visas. However, this not being a perfect world, the US must do its best to balance the importance of visa applications and national security.
Most visitors to the United States enter through the country’s Visa Waiver Program. The Visa Waiver Program allows travelers from 36 countries to temporarily visit the United States without a visa. Currently, Argentina, Brazil, Poland and Taiwan are not part of the Visa Waiver Program. Many feel that these nations should be added because their residents are not likely to illegally overstay their visas and decide to stay in the United States indefinitely.
It is also tough for tourists from countries like India, China, Mexico to use their passports to travel to the US because they must obtain nonimmigrant visas. The nonimmigrant visa process is lengthy and expensive.
Passport holders who live far away from their country’s visa processing centers must visit the interview location without knowing whether or not their visas will be approved. A proposed solution to the visa interview process is videoconferencing. However, the US Department of State is not willing to explore this option due to safety and technological concerns.
Prior to 9/11, in-person visa application interviews were not required. Visas could be approved by consular officials based solely on responses entered into the visa application. Visa applicants must go through more intense screenings that include fingerprint checks and facial recognition screening of passport photographs.
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