Travel industry fears paperwork delays from Trump visa order

Bart Jansen
USA TODAY
Afghan school girls work on robot machine at a school in Herat, Afghanistan on July 4, 2017. According to reports, six Afghan teenage girls have been denied visas to travel United States for an international robotics competition, but they will be permitted to send their machine designed to compete without them.

Travel groups urged the Trump administration Thursday to reconsider visa changes that the groups worried could delay processing for travelers eager to visit the U.S.

President Trump signed the order June 21 as a step to better vet travelers, to thwart terrorists from sneaking into the country. The order updated President Barack Obama’s 2012 order that sought to speed processing of non-immigrant visas, dropping a goal that 80% of applicants should be processed within three weeks.

The State Department issued a statement Thursday saying that rescinding the processing deadline provided "flexibility to determine when longer processing times may be appropriate to accomplish our fundamental mission to protect our borders."

But the 20 travel groups wrote to Trump, with copies to Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly, urging them to reconsider the order.

The groups including the U.S. Travel Association, the American Hotel and Lodging Association, the American Society of Travel Agents and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce warned delays in approving travel documents could hurt the industry that generated $2.4 trillion in economic activity last year, with one in nine jobs depending on the industry.

"We are concerned that the removal of this provision will negatively impact consular affairs operations, and the timely processing of visas for prospective travelers," the letter said. “We request that you reconsider this new order, and review the possible economic ramifications of this significant policy change."

Trump didn’t publicize the order when he signed it. But a cornerstone of his campaign last year and his administration so far is to provide better security screening people arriving in the U.S., whether through a wall along the southern border with Mexico or a temporary ban on arrivals from six Muslim-majority countries in the Middle East and Africa.

The brief order eliminated the three-week goal for processing visas, which can sometimes take months and typically require a face-to-face interview at a consulate. The State Department processed nearly 10.4 million short-term visas last year.

Estimated wait times for consulate appointments are available on the department's web site. For example, the current wait time for an appointment for a visitor's visa in Sao Paulo is three days, in Beijing is 14 days and in Moscow is 44 days. 

The department said it would continue to monitor appointment wait times, and provide expedited appointments for students and in cases of urgent business, medical and humanitarian travel.