United States Visas - Visa Denial

Visa Denial

Section 221(g) of Immigration and Nationality Act defined several classes of aliens ineligible to receive visas.

Grounds for denial may include, but are not limited to:

• Health grounds
• Criminal grounds
• Security grounds
• Public charge (charge means burden in this context)
• Illegal entrants or immigration violators
• Failure to produce requested documents
• Ineligible for citizenship
• Previously removed from US

Section 214(b) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (also cited as 8 United States Code § 1184(b)) states that most aliens must be presumed to be intending to remain in the US, until and unless they are able to show that they are entitled to nonimmigrant status. This means there are two sides to a 214(b) denial. Either

1. The applicant didn’t convince the consular officer that he didn’t intend to stay in the US permanently, or
2. The applicant didn’t convince the consular officer that he was qualified for the visa for which he had applied.

An example of a denial based upon the first ground would be an applicant for an F-1 student visa who the consular officer felt was secretly intending to remain in the US permanently.

An example of a denial based upon the second ground would be an H-1B applicant who couldn’t prove he possessed the equivalent of a US bachelor’s degree in a specialty field—such an equivalency being a requirement for obtaining an H-1B visa.

In order to thereafter obtain a visa applicants are recommended to objectively evaluate their situation, see in what way they fell short of the visa requirements, and then reapply.