Tourists from Malawi and Zambia are first to face $15,000 visa bonds in US

The United States Department of State has announced the archetypal overseas citizens to beryllium taxable to bonds of up to $15,000 should they sojourn the state connected tourer visas.

On Tuesday, Zambia and Malawi, some African countries, were the inaugural entries connected a list of countries that the State Department volition taxable to visa bonds.

The idea, announced earlier this week, is to enforce bonds connected countries whose citizens person precocious rates of overstaying their US visas.

Tourists from those countries would person to wage an magnitude ranging from $5,000 to $15,000 astatine the clip of their visa interrogation to participate the US. Then, if the tourer departs connected oregon earlier their visa’s expiration, that magnitude would beryllium refunded to them.

The wealth would besides beryllium returned if the visa were cancelled, if the question does not occur, oregon if the tourer is denied introduction into the US.

Should a tourer overstay their visa — oregon use for asylum oregon different immigration-related programme portion successful the US — the national authorities would support the money.

More countries, successful summation to Malawi and Zambia, are expected to beryllium added to the list. The enslaved request is slated to instrumentality effect for those 2 countries starting connected August 20.

“This targeted, common-sense measurement reinforces the administration’s committedness to US migration instrumentality portion deterring visa overstays,” State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce said connected Tuesday.

US President Donald Trump has taken a hardline attack to migration since his instrumentality to bureau successful January for a 2nd term.

On his archetypal time backmost successful office, Trump signed an enforcement bid called “Protecting the American People Against Invasion”, which denounced the “unprecedented flood of amerciable immigration” into the US.

It pledged to forcefully execute US migration laws. That enforcement bid was yet cited arsenic the ground for the caller visa bonds.

The bonds are portion of a aviator programme announced connected Monday, slated to past 12 months.

“This [temporary last rule] addresses the Trump Administration’s telephone to support the American radical by faithfully executing the migration laws of the United States,” a filing to the Federal Register reads.

Every year, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) releases a study astir visa overstays successful the US.

The astir recent report, released successful 2024, recovered that determination were 565,155 visa overstays for fiscal twelvemonth 2023. That amounted to lone 1.45 percent of the full non-immigrant admissions into the US.

“In different words, 98.55 percent of the in-scope nonimmigrant visitors departed the United States on-time and successful accordance with the presumption of their admission,” the study explains.

In its breakdown of country-by-country overstay rates, the study indicated that some Malawi and Zambia had comparatively precocious visa overstay rates, astatine 14.3 and 11.1 percent, respectively.

But Zambia and Malawi are some smaller countries with comparatively fewer tourism- oregon business-related arrivals successful the US.

According to the report, lone 1,655 radical arrived from Malawi successful fiscal twelvemonth 2023 for concern oregon pleasure. Of that total, 237 overstayed their visas.

Meanwhile, 3,493 radical arrived from Zambia for tourism oregon concern during the aforesaid clip frame. Of that total, 388 surpassed their visa limits.

Those numbers are dwarfed by the sheer numbers from larger, much populous countries with larger user bases. An estimated 20,811 Brazilians stayed successful the US longer than their tourism oregon concern visas allowed, for instance, and 40,884 overstays were from Colombia.

Critics person besides pointed retired that the recently imposed bonds enactment question to the US — already a pricey imaginable — further retired of scope for residents of poorer countries.

The Council connected American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), an advocacy group, was among those that denounced the caller enslaved strategy arsenic discriminatory. It described the strategy arsenic a signifier of exploitation — a “legalised shakedown” — successful a statement connected Tuesday.

“This is not astir nationalist security,” said Robert McCaw, CAIR’s authorities affairs director. “It’s astir weaponising migration argumentation to extort susceptible visitors, punish disfavored countries, and crook America’s invited mat into a paywall.”

Citizens of countries that are portion of the US’s visa waiver programmes are not taxable to the visa bonds unveiled this week.