New US visa restrictions for pregnant women

The Trump administration has issued new visa restrictions aimed at restricting inbound birth tourism to the USA. Applicants will have to prove they are seeking medical treatment and they have the money to pay for it. The chances of success are slim however.

Women travel to the USA to give birth so their children can have a coveted U.S. passport.

Visa applicants, deemed by consular officers as going to the USA primarily to give birth, will now be treated like other foreigners going to the USA for medical treatment, according to new State Department guidance. Applicants will have to prove they are seeking medical treatment and they have the money to pay for it.

The practice of coming to the U.S. to give birth is legal, although there are a few cases of authorities arresting operators of birth tourism agencies for visa fraud or tax evasion. Inbound birth tourists are often honest about their intentions when applying for visas and even show signed contracts with doctors and hospitals.

President Trump has threatened to end the practice, it not easy to do and there are no figures to support his allegations that it is widespread.

Regulating tourist visas for pregnant women may seem to be a solution, but raises questions about how immigration officials can determine whether a woman is pregnant, and whether a woman could get turned away by border officers who suspect she may be pregnant just by looking at her.

Although now advised that they are not allowed to ask if a visa applicant is or intends to become pregnant, consular officials overseas now have to determine whether a visa applicant is pregnant, and only then can they ask if she is going to the USA primarily to give birth. The question may arise only if the applicant admits that medical treatment is the main purpose of the visit.

Birth tourism is lucrative business and American companies take out advertisements and charge up to US$80,000 to help the practice, offering hotel rooms and medical care. The Trump allegations are that many of the women travel from Russia and China to give birth in the USA, but this may be historic as officials were prosecuting birth tourism agencies even before Trump was elected.

There are no figures on how many foreign women travel to the USA specifically to give birth, and with high numbers of Chinese and Russian women legally resident in the USA, media reports can mix up legal resident births with real birth tourists.

The new rules on birth tourism are as much aimed at criminal activity associated with the birth tourism industry, as birth tourism mothers. In an election year the rules are more aimed at potential Trump supporters than really trying to solve something that may no longer be a problem.

During interviews with journalists, the State Department said that they had no statistics on birth tourism numbers or costs, and that judging pregnancy is by visual clues only; consular officials have no real way of knowing if a visa applicant can pay for treatment; and that there are no ways of knowing if people are actually going to the USA for medical treatment or just on vacation.