Transcript of the above video: 

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing yeah, now it looks like they are tightening up certain requirements, certain rules associated with different types of visas in the US. Unlike most of the videos we make on this channel, where we focus on Fiancé(e) Visas, Marriage Visas, Waivers, Consular Processing, on this video we are specifically actually focusing on Tourist Visas and Visas associated with Journalism and things. 

I thought of making this video after reading a recent article from the Bangkok Post, bangkokpost.com, the article is titled: US to tighten Visa regulations for foreign students, journalists. Quoting directly: "The Trump Administration moved on Thursday to tighten the duration of visas for foreign students, cultural exchange visitors and journalists." So what this looks to me like - and I'll get into this further - it looks like the F Visas and the J Visas are going to be the focus of this. Now we have dealt with these type of visas pretty frequently in the past. Student Visas, J-1 Exchange visitors that sometimes you see in the context of Au Pair going to the United States, and then for journalists you have got the I Visa. But that said, let me go ahead and get into this further. Quoting further: "The new final rule from the Department of Homeland Security creates a fixed time period for F Visas for international students, J Visas that allow visitors on cultural exchange programs to work in the United States, and I Visas for members of the media. Those visas are currently available for the duration of the program or employment in the US." Quoting further: "The effective date is 60 days from publication in the Federal Register, subject to Congressional review." And that's an important thing to point out. If this is 60 days from publication, we are sitting here in mid-July - mid-August, mid-September, this will probably become final rule before we even get through the midterm elections and obviously before we get to the next Congress. So I expect at least for a period of time, this will probably remain a rule that is on the books. Now we could see a massive shake up in Congress - I don't want to get into politics here, but there usually is in circumstances like this - and frankly, I think circumstances are such that I suspect there will be a major shake-up in Congress. What the results of that are, remain to be seen. 

That said, we could see this change some time next year, as with other policies involving Immigration. Not saying that is a foregone conclusion, but something to maybe keep in the back of your mind. That said, quoting further: "President Donald Trump, a Republican, kicked off a wide-ranging immigration crackdown after taking office in January 2025." Important to point out, and I have discussed this in other videos, I had serious issues with the illegality of Immigration in the last Administration especially. I mean I specifically made videos about Alejandro Mayorkas; I thought his tenure as Department of Homeland Security Head was abysmal to say the least. It rose to level in my opinion that frankly the impeachment I thought was warranted. You get into whether or not he should have been removed, quite honestly, either due to incompetence or he was just running his own policies, I think it probably would have been better for the country if he had been removed. That being said, we went through basically that. I think it's important to point out the difference between legal and illegal immigration though. And again while I commend the Trump Administration, Mr. Holman getting the border at least some semblance of under control, that's great, I really question whether or not going at; the Immigrant Visa Pause for spouses of American citizens, especially out here in Thailand, the oldest ally of the United States in East Asia, that didn't make a lot of sense to me, especially in light of the fact that they said they were doing it or are doing it, retooling it for purposes of determining people who might go on welfare in the United States. I mean the number of Thais that immigrate to the US to begin with is low. Of that, the subset of them that end up on welfare I would say is almost minuscule. That being said, here we are. 

Now in this situation, again, I think reasonable people can disagree. Frankly in Trump's first Administration, I agreed with getting rid of things like duration of status where people could end up going into the United States on an F Visa and then live there for decades and strictly speaking never falling into overstay basically due to a sort of quirk in the law that allowed for these D/S stamps at the time to allow people to just be there. And then the question became, when did one's status end, and it could never be adjudicated. They made some rules on that. I think that wasn't a terrible idea. Some of these new rules though I do kind of question whether or not they're even all that necessary. That said, I don't deal with that much immigration from a domestic standpoint inside the United States. So under the current circumstances, I will give him the benefit of the doubt. 

That said, quoting further: "His administration has increased scrutiny of legal immigration, revoking Student Visas and Green Cards of University students over their ideological views and stripping legal status from hundreds of thousands of migrants." Now I have problems with just stripping legal status without due process, but under some of these circumstances, people are there under temporary circumstances that go on forever. I can understand saying, "hey, we need to scrutinize that again." Also, this whole thing of ‘over their ideological views’, well were they violently protesting? I kind of get into where does ideological views begin and end, and if you are in someone else's country, it would be like if foreigners came to Thailand and started protesting something having to do with internal Thai matters, I am pretty sure as a naturalized Thai, I would be sitting there going, "yeah, it might be time for them to go." 

So again, I know that's not a position that most immigration attorneys take, but you do have to look at the totality of the circumstances in some of these cases and look at the fact that look, at the end of the day, I think the Administration has some pretty firm ground to stand on when they say we need reform. My question is why? After Mr. Trump having twice now been President of the United States and having twice now held both Houses of Congress in his own Party during the first half of his terms, and presumably he may end up holding both Houses in the next half of his term - this time I kind of doubt it. I think at least one of the Houses will probably go the other way - it's just the nature of American politics, or the cycle if you will of American politics. That said, he could have done a lot of damage to the Democrats early on in his tenure as President and sort of seems to have decided not to do that. But the long story short, I question, why isn't this being done legislatively? Let's just change the laws and then we can go after folks. Instead of using all of this far-fetched, attenuated legal reasoning and rulemaking, why not go into Congress and really get a Bill passed, real comprehensive immigration reform? I don't know why. Doesn't make a lot of sense to me.

That said, quoting further: "The latest action would create new hurdles for international students, exchange workers and foreign journalists. Under the new regulations, the student and exchange visa periods would be no longer than four years. The Visa for journalists which currently can last years would be up to 240 days or in the case of Chinese Nationals, 90 days. The Visa holders could apply for extensions it said." Yeah, you know I have got to be honest with you. With the digitization of everything, and everything is supposed to be so much more streamlined, and it is so much more efficient with all of that, it makes a degree of sense to me. In the past, I could see the argument where we don't want to keep re-adjudicating and just continuously processing bales and bales of paper for somebody who really is legitimately in the United States. Again, for some of these foreign “journalists” - which that term might be applied rather loosely depending on underlying circumstances - to my mind it does make a degree of sense to say, "look, we are going to truncate the amount of time you get in lawful status, and then we will re-adjudicate you on an extension basis. I can see where reasonable people might disagree with that. That said, it remains to be seen how all this plays out. We will certainly be keeping folks updated on this channel as the situation evolves.