Visa Waiver Program in the News
The Visa Waiver Program has been in the news recently. While new countries have been recently welcomed into the program (for example, the Slovak Republic, Estonia and Latvia), Congress, with Senator Diane Feinstein chairing, recently held hearings on perceived problems with the program. It’s a good time to review some of the basics of the program.
Someone who enters the US on the Visa Waiver Program has 90 days to stay in order to visit the U.S. If you stay longer than the 90-day limit by more than 180 days but less that 365 days and then leave the U.S. you will face a three-year bar from re-entering the US. If you overstay the 90-day period by one year or more and then leave, you are going to be barred from re-entering for tens years.
This does not mean that you get 90 days and then an extra 179 days! If you overstay the 90 day period by just one day and then leave, while you won’t be subject to the three year ban, you are probably going to have a difficult time re-entering later on. You won’t be able to get back in under the Visa Waiver Program. You will have to apply for a B-2 visitor’s visa at a U.S. embassy with all that that entails (proof of your foreign residence that you will be returning to, etc) and you can expect the application to be carefully scrutinized. The bottom line is—don’t overstay.
What if you overstay on a Visa Waiver Program entry and then are apprehended by Immigration and Customs Enforcement? You can be removed from the U.S. without a hearing before an Immigration Judge and, regardless of how short or long your overstay, you’ll be subject to a ten-year bar on your re-entry.
You definitely cannot work in the U.S. while here under the Visa Waiver Program; if you do, you're going to be inadmissible to the U.S. in the future almost without exception.
You can’t extend the 90-day visa waiver period unless you have a really compelling reason (such as a serious health issue) for asking for an extension.
You also can’t change or adjust your status if you enter the U.S. under the Visa Waiver Program, unless you are trying to do so on the basis of a I-130 petition by an immediate relative. But you need to be very careful about this. You cannot enter the U.S. under the Visa Waiver Program if you really have immigrant intent such an really intending the have a U.S. relative file an I-130 for you so you can stay.
