Dave Seminara, The Wall Street Journal, Nov 11; see also (1)
Enforce the ‘public charge’ provision of immigration law, and be more cautious about granting visas.
Birth tourism is real. Foreign women come to America to give birth to U.S. citizens. When I worked as a consular officer at U.S. embassies overseas, I frequently interviewed mothers-to-be for their visa applications. And I was often compelled to renew U.S. passports for children who had been born in America but never lived there. I complied with the law but felt as if I was complicit in a scam.
When applying for visas, few prospective birth tourists admitted their intentions, even though it isn’t illegal for foreign visitors to give birth in the U.S. Women wearing heavy coats in the middle of summer to conceal their bulging bellies would swear they couldn’t wait to visit a long-lost cousin they hadn’t seen in 20 years. When they’d return a little later to renew their tourist visas—new children with U.S. passports in tow—I’d ask for evidence they’d paid their medical bills. I’d frequently hear “I never got a bill” or “No one ever asked us to pay.”
Some of these applicants could have been refused under the Immigration and Nationality Act’s “public charge” provision, which covers aliens likely to become primarily dependent on government assistance. But we were discouraged from doing so, as it was difficult to prove and invited complaints. In 2017 consular officers adjudicated more than 13 million nonimmigrant visa applications. Only 47 were refused under the public-charge provision.
PHOTO: ISTOCK/GETTY IMAGES
Consular work can be stressful, but there was nothing more frustrating than issuing American passports for children, teens and young adults who could not speak English and had never lived in the U.S. It wasn’t their fault—their parents had gamed our system, acquiring passports as a kind of ultimate souvenir. Even diplomats, whose children born in the U.S. aren’t supposed to be eligible for citizenship since they aren’t subject to U.S. jurisdiction, get in on the act. An African ambassador I got to know obtained American passports for his three children born in the U.S. “No one ever asked me where I worked,” he told me.
When birth-tourist children turn 21, they can file petitions for spouses, siblings and parents to get green cards. But American expatriates with foreign spouses whose children are born abroad don’t automatically qualify for U.S. citizenship due to the law’s physical-presence requirements. Go figure.
I oppose granting citizenship to the children of aliens who live in the U.S. illegally because it rewards their parents for breaking the law and encourages others to do the same. But it’s a question worthy of debate, since they live here. Birth tourism, on the other hand, is indefensible. The only other rich country that grants birthright citizenship is Canada, but its Conservative Party voted at its convention in August to end the practice. Irish citizens voted 79% to 21% to end birthright citizenship in a 2004 referendum.
There are steps U.S. authorities can take to discourage birth tourism:
• U.S. tourist-visa approval rates are shockingly high in countries such as China (85%), Russia (88%), Mexico (78%) and India (77%). Consular officers need to screen applicants more rigorously and enforce the public-charge provision.
• Visitors with visas are typically granted an initial stay of 180 days and can apply for six-month extensions. Citizens of many countries, including China, can obtain multiple-entry 10-year visas that allow them to live in the U.S. as “tourists” for years. Granting visitors this much time enables birth tourism to flourish. The countries that send the most birth tourists, such as China and Mexico, shouldn’t qualify for 10-year visas.
• It’s illegal to misrepresent one’s purpose of travel to the United States. So if a would-be birth tourist tells the embassy she’s coming to the U.S. to play in a volleyball tournament, then shows up at the border looking very pregnant, she can be sent home. This provision of the law needs to be enforced more regularly.
• The U.S. should require hospitals to report to immigration authorities when foreign nationals give birth but fail to pay their bills. Then they can be refused as public charges when they try to renew their visas.
As a father, I can understand the instinct to try to seek a better life for one’s children. But birth tourism makes a mockery of what it means to be an American.
Mr. Seminara is a journalist and former diplomat.
No comments:
Post a Comment