How the United States Alienates Foreign Friends Without Really Trying

Why does our government insult, demean and frustrate people who want to visit America?

I have fresh experience to testify that the USA has institutionalized bureaucratic discourtesy and distain for prospective foreign visitors. For tourists and students, the process of obtaining a non-residential visa is extremely and unnecessarily tedious.

Recently when I was filling out an application for my niece in Medellin, Colombia to come to Houston, I found that the US Embassy web site had no comprehensive list of requirements. At first, I filled out the visa application and thought that was the end of it. By accident on another part of the web site, I found that my niece needed much more [a police report and a medical certificate among other things]. One can diligently search the US government web site and not find all the information necessary to file a complete and proper application.

For example, it is not listed that applicants must go to specified banks to obtain a PIN number that allows them to fill in information on a web site administered by a call center to set up an appointment with the American Embassy in Bogotá. The applicant must pay the equivalent of $20 for 15 minutes time. If they exceed that time, then they pay another $20 for another pin number.

At the time of the application, my wife was at home in a hospital bed with 24 hour oxygen recovering from cardiac difficulties. On the forms, there were several grounds for requesting a non-residential visa but humanitarian issues are not considered. My Congressman John Culberson asked the American Embassy in Bogota give our niece every consideration in her application. I have a feeling that it was only because of the congressman that she obtained the visa.

When my niece arrived at the Houston Intercontinental airport, the immigration authorities held her for more than two hours in secondary detention. Their tone was frequently rough and sarcastic. Apparently thinking they knew more about my wife’s conditions than the doctors, they asked why I could not take care of my wife all by myself. They softened a little when she showed them her old passport that indicated that she had returned home to Colombia one month before the allotted time of visitation during her last trip here nine years go. Also a series of phone calls to US customs and immigration officials from my brother, an international lawyer, may have helped my niece be released from airport detention.

It is important to note that my niece is, and has been, an excellent, law abiding citizen and foreign visitor and that her visa application was completely and properly filled out.

Our government’s shabby ‘treatment’ of foreign friends does US foreign policy no good. Our tedious visa process cuts down on the number of people applying. Criminals and terrorists can manufacture backgrounds. They can also pay for fraudulent police reports. Our tourism revenue is decreased as well as the number of foreign students. One continuing aid to the US economy is people who are trained in our universities. When they go back home, they will seek American goods and services. If they get frustrated by the rigarmorale, they will study in other places and buy products there.

If Colombian immigration were to treat Americans like this, Hugo Chavez would seem like a friend.

Ed O’Rourke is a certified public accountant in Houston, Texas, USA. He has a master’s degree in Latin American Studies from the University of Texas at Austin.