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06-08-2025
WASHINGTON: The United States could require up to $15,000 bonds for some tourist and business visas under a pilot program launching in two weeks.
The Department of State notice released on Monday said the effort aims to deter those who overstay their visas.
The 12-month pilot program, which will begin on August 20, will target those seeking B-1 or B-2 visas from countries with high rates of overstays although the document does not identify the nations. In June, the US government announced the possibility of full or partial travel bans on visitors from 36 countries with high rates of overstays among other concerns.
The State Department said in its announcement the program could bring in $20m over the course of a year.
“The Pilot Program is further designed to serve as a diplomatic tool to encourage foreign governments to take all appropriate actions to ensure robust screening and vetting for all citizens in matters of identity verification and public safety,” the release said.
The release notes that historically the State Department has discouraged requiring travelers to the US to post a bond, saying processing the bonds would be “cumbersome”.
In 2020 at the end of President Donald Trump’s first administration, the White House rolled out a similar six-month program that targeted two dozen countries, most of which were in Africa. It was not fully implemented due to the drop in global travel associated with the COVID-19 pandemic, the notice said
The Trump administration said the new program would be a diplomatic deterrent for bad actors trying to enter the US. According to the report, there were 500,000 suspected overstays in the fiscal year 2023.
Trump has made cracking down on immigration a central focus of his presidency, surging resources to secure the border and arresting tens of thousands of undocumented migrants, including many who are seeking legal status.
The administration has justified its arrests and deportations on repeated claims that those who are “unlawfully present in the United States present significant threats to national security and public safety” although overwhelming evidence has shown that immigrants commit crimes at lower rates than naturally born Americans.
A report presented to the US House of Representatives in 2024 looking at Texas arrest records determined that both documented and undocumented immigrants commit crimes at a lower rate than US citizens with undocumented migrants arrested less than half as often as native-born citizens. A 2021 study by Oxford Economics similarly found that undocumented immigrants are 33 percent less likely to be incarcerated than US citizens.
Last month, there were shackles at her wrists. Her waist. Her ankles.
The memory of being bound still haunts 19-year-old Ximena Arias Cristobal even after her release from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody.
Nearly a month after her arrest, the Georgia college student said she is still grappling with how her life has been transformed. One day in early May, she was pulled over for a minor traffic stop: turning right on a red light. The next thing she knew, she was in a detention centre, facing a court date for her deportation.
“That experience is something I’ll never forget. It left a mark on me, emotionally and mentally,” Arias Cristobal said during a news conference on Tuesday, recounting her time at the Stewart Detention Center in Lumpkin, Georgia.
“What hurts more,” she added, “is knowing that millions of others have gone through and are still going through the same kind of pain”. (Int’l Monitoring Desk)
