Help! Tourist Visa

[Stats84 1]

Hi, I am a US citizen living abroad with my gf. Trying to get her a tourist visa so we can go to the US for a visit. She was denied the first time because apparently I didnt have enough proof that Id be returning with her. She has enough proof though. I guess in this situation, both parties have to have proof of return. I dont have residency but am planning on buying a small business and getting a bank account as well as a joint bank account. What else should I do before she makes the next appointment? Please help!

[English Muffin 59]

What country is she from?

[Stats84 1]

What country is she from?

In SE Asia...just prefer to keep things private...its safe to say its more difficult here than in other places.

[English Muffin 59]

You might just have to accept that she'll never get one, that's just the way it is with some countries. Having a USC bf will be making it much more difficult for her I'm afraid.

[Old Dominion 26]

Having been turned down once, the chances are unlikely unless there has been some major change in her situation (not likely) that compels her to return home. Your situation is irrelevant to the consulate - she alone must prove she will need to return home.

[JimVaPhuong 4,863]

What country is she from?

In SE Asia...just prefer to keep things private...its safe to say its more difficult here than in other places.

Vietnam?

In short, not a snowball's chance in hell!

Sorry about being so rude, but that's the way it is. My fiancee has a solid job, makes a decent living, owns her home, and has kids in Vietnam that would require her to return. By Vietnam standards, she's got pretty strong ties to compel her to return. Everyone I've asked, including two attorneys, have said she has absolutely zero chance of getting a tourist visa to the US. Fraud is just so high that tourist visas are nearly impossible to get.

On the other hand, if she's a big shot in some company there, or reasonably high up in the government then she might have a shot at a B1 if she can come up with an official reason to visit the US.

[Stats84 1]

Thanks for the responses. She had a very long interview but was stopped when the consulate asked her if I had residency or a business here. She asked what needed to be done so that she could be approved next time and was told that I needed residency or a business. I almost feel like I hurt her chances.

Jim, your case is ridiculous. She should be approved.

[JimVaPhuong 4,863]

Thanks for the responses. She had a very long interview but was stopped when the consulate asked her if I had residency or a business here. She asked what needed to be done so that she could be approved next time and was told that I needed residency or a business. I almost feel like I hurt her chances.

Jim, your case is ridiculous. She should be approved.

A very long interview in HCM is usually a bad sign. It means the consular officer is digging hard for a reason to deny the visa. A short interview is usually a slam dunk one way or the other.

I don't think my case is ridiculous, looking at the big picture. Fraud is huge in Vietnam. There are a lot of people with ties as strong as my fiancee's, who would gladly walk away from everything for a shot at coming to the US, even if it meant they'd be illegal after arriving and overstaying their visa. You have see it in perspective. Thousands of people died in rickety boats in the late 70's to mid 80's trying to escape that country. The ones who survived spent months or years in disease infested refugee camps. They did all this for the hope of being able to come to the US and start a new life. Many families were divided for years until the VN government started allowing Viet Kieu to return as visitors. Many Vietnamese today just want to be reunited with their families in the US, and they would do practically anything to achieve that.

I understand completely why the consulate would not be able to issue a visitor's visa to my fiancee, and I can't really blame them. I know my fiancee very very well. I know she wouldn't jeopardize her chances of coming and staying here legally by overstaying a visitor's visa. Besides, her life in Vietnam is the not the miserable existence that it is for some Vietnamese people. She could be contented and reasonably comfortable there for the rest of her life. However, because Vietnamese men are reluctant to marry older divorced women with children, she'd probably spend that life alone. She has a chance now to share the rest of her life with man who loves her deeply, and whom she loves just as deeply, and live in a country where you don't have to bribe every government official to get them to do their job. She wouldn't risk that over a visitor's visa.

I also have no doubt about my fiancee's sincerity and commitment to me. We chat for hours every day. Sometimes she wakes up in the middle of the night and wants to chat because she can't sleep. She even replaced her "bomb site" toilet with a western style toilet so that I'd feel more comfortable in her home, and paved her driveway so that I wouldn't have to feel around for the stones on dark rainy nights! When I told her that the pale blue paint made her home seem dark under the fluorescent lights that everyone in Vietnam uses, she repainted the entire house - pink!

On the other hand, the consulate in HCM doesn't know that's she's any different from the hundreds of other applicants they process every week, a good percentage of whom would clear customs in the US and disappear into the country.

[Stats84 1]

Judging from my case, perhaps she would get a visa if you had some ties in Vietnam and reason to return there.

[Dakine 26]

To get approval for B2 visas in all countries in SE Asia people have to show GOOD reasons they HAVE to return home.

[JimVaPhuong 4,863]

Judging from my case, perhaps she would get a visa if you had some ties in Vietnam and reason to return there.

A tourist visa doesn't require the applicant to have any connection whatever with a US citizen. The applicant has to qualify for the visa on their own merits. However, the consulate will take other factors into consideration if they believe the applicant intends to use the tourist visa to attempt to immigrate to the US, and they presume this in every case.

I think the problem in your case was that your girlfriend COULD use a tourist visa to legally immigrate to the US. If you and her married in the US then she could legally remain in the US and apply for a green card, provided she could satisfy USCIS that it wasn't her intention to immigrate when she entered the US. The consulate is going to suspect that this might be the intention of the applicant in every case - they are required by law to presume every applicant is an intending immigrant. The fact that you, her US citizen boyfriend, were going to be traveling to the US with her raises their level of suspicion. This is where your ties to Vietnam come into play - the fact that you don't have strong ties that would require you to return with your girlfriend before her visa expires raises their suspicion even more.

Both your girlfriend and my fiancee would have a better chance of getting a tourist visa if they didn't have a relationship with a US citizen. My fiancee would also have to address the fact that she has family living in the US - another strong motive to immigrate. Even without a US citizen fiance, she could still come to the US on a tourist visa, hook up with a US citizen and get married, and then remain in the US and apply for a green card.

As I said, the consulate is required by law to presume every applicant is an intending immigrant. However, they can't just deny a visa because they think it smells funny if all of the other requirements have been met. The long interview suggests they were having a hard time finding the evidence they needed to deny, and they ultimately decided that you would be that evidence. Even if you became a citizen of Vietnam, abandoned your US citizenship, bought a company in Vietnam, and even joined the Communist Party, the consulate would still try to find a reason to deny your girlfriend a tourist visa. In order to get a tourist visa your girlfriend is going to need to prove that she has a lot more to lose by abandoning her life in Vietnam than she has to gain by immigrating to the US.

As ridiculous as all of this sounds, keep in mind that this isn't about preventing immigration to the US. It's about preventing the use of a non-immigrant visa for immigration purposes. There are legal ways to immigrate to the US, but they take a lot longer, and except for fiancee and spousal visas, they are designed to manage the influx of immigrants into the US. It is the consulate's duty to see that people don't use the tourist visa as a fast track path to immigrate.

[Stats84 1]

Thank you for your thoughts. I've done a lot of research on it and you've added a thing or two that I may have missed. Sounds almost impossible. Let me ask you this. I was looking at the spousal visa options and the DCF thing seems best. Its not so much that we want to be in the US, its just for a visit. We actually arent planning to move to the USA for another year. After we get married abroad, how hard is it to get a tourist visa to the US? Assuming we do the DCF filing and wait....then in the meantime can we trip to the US? Second question, we did have a potential biz reason (very strong reason) to go the US, both of us. If a company sponsored us/her, would that help the current situation? Third, my home is close to the CAD border. If she wanted to get a tourist visa to Canada, how difficult is that? My family could easily visit us there? Thank you.

[JimVaPhuong 4,863]

Thank you for your thoughts. I've done a lot of research on it and you've added a thing or two that I may have missed. Sounds almost impossible. Let me ask you this. I was looking at the spousal visa options and the DCF thing seems best. Its not so much that we want to be in the US, its just for a visit. We actually arent planning to move to the USA for another year. After we get married abroad, how hard is it to get a tourist visa to the US? Assuming we do the DCF filing and wait....then in the meantime can we trip to the US? Second question, we did have a potential biz reason (very strong reason) to go the US, both of us. If a company sponsored us/her, would that help the current situation? Third, my home is close to the CAD border. If she wanted to get a tourist visa to Canada, how difficult is that? My family could easily visit us there? Thank you.

Again, as strange as it sounds, getting married will actually make her chances of getting a tourist visa worse. In the mind of the consulate, it would no longer be simply likely that she intends to immigrate - it would be a virtual certainty.

DCF is definitely easier if you plan to marry abroad and get a CR1 visa. This comes with the bonus of an automatic green card. The downside, for your situation, is that the green card requires primary residency in the US. If she stays outside the US for more than a year without a re-entry permit, then she'll be considered to have abandoned her residency, and her green card will be null and void.

If you are committed to this lady, and want to spend your life with her, this is what I would suggest:

Marry her, and then apply for a CR1 with the consulate (DCF). When the visa is approved, go to the US, get her green card, and establish residency. You can return to her foreign country after this, but be prepared to spend at least half of your time in the US for the next 3 years. At the end of the 3 years, she can apply for US citizenship as long as she's still married to you. Once she gets her citizenship, she can leave the US whenever she wants, and stay gone as long as she likes. You'll both be free to come and go whenever you please. Problem solved forever.

As far as I know, the only kind of visas that would allow a business to sponsor her is a work visa (H1, H2, etc.). This would require her to work for the US company. These are strictly rationed, and often used up within weeks of becoming available each year. There are also various types of exchange and training visas, but I don't know if any of these would apply to her. If she's just coming to visit for business purposes then she'd need a B1, which has pretty much the same requirements as a B2 tourist visa, and is just as difficult to get in Vietnam.

[Stats84 1]

Hi, what about the Canada scenario? Is it much more likely that she could get a tourist visa to Canada, with me sponsoring?

[JimVaPhuong 4,863]

Hi, what about the Canada scenario? Is it much more likely that she could get a tourist visa to Canada, with me sponsoring?

I know practically nothing about Canadian immigration law, other than US citizens don't usually need a visa to visit, but they do need a passport to cross the border. If they offered some sort of visitors visa that required a sponsor I don't see how a US citizen could be that sponsor. I have heard that visas to Canada are easier to get, but I really don't know this for a fact.