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As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing US Tourist Visas specifically for Thai Nationals. We have done a number of videos on US Tourist Visas in the past especially in the context of what is called section 214b of the Immigration and Nationality Act which oftentimes creates the affirmative duty if you will on the part of the Consular Officer adjudicating an application for a US Tourist Visa, it creates an affirmative duty on that person to go ahead and do what is called a "strong ties, weak ties" analysis, no pun intended, "ties", not Thais like Thai Nationals, but strong ties weak ties analysis. Basically that Officer is going to be adjudicating that case on the base that "does this applicant demonstrate strong ties to their home country, presumably Thailand or some other Third Country outside of the United States and, and weak ties to the United States?" So do they have relatively weak ties to the USA?

Now from prior videos, I have had people contact me over the years, correspond with me, talk to me in person, coming into the office whatever and they say "man you are really pessimistic about US Tourist Visas." My response is "no not really, I am just more realistic about the actual legal environment in which those visas operate and in which those visas can be issued." But that is to say I seem pessimistic because I see it a lot in one context. Understand if you are like a Thai National, you just live in Thailand, you have no real connections to an American, then the Tourist Visa process will probably be relatively straightforward. Unfortunately due the nature of section 214b, what I am usually talking about is a Thai National who has a connection to an American, most notably oftentimes a romantic connection to an American, so this is the fiancée of America, the spouse of an American or even the significant other of an American, they haven't made any concrete plans to legalize their relationship or anything of that nature but still they have a relationship. That relationship in and of itself can mitigate against the weak ties analysis under Section 214b and result in a number of denials, and a pretty high number of denials quite honestly from the US Consulate here in Thailand.

So we are talking about you want to take your girlfriend back to the United States, a lot of those Tourist Visas if you are here in Thailand, are probably going to be denied again due to section 214b. What they are really worried about is what is called, again under the Immigration and Nationality Act, an intending immigrant without proper documentation. This is someone who is going to the United States ostensibly as a Tourist or a non-Immigrant, Student Visa for example, and they are trying to use it in order to just live there forever, so-called "Robin Hoods" if you will. People that go to a different country under one intentionally and then try to use it to reside and eventually just live there. Now this doesn't happen quite as often as it once did out of Thailand again because the Embassy has put in place protocols to sort of mitigate against this issue and section 214b is a good example of that. That is to say, it is not impossible to get a US Tourist Visa by any stretch of the imagination but it is going to be very much dependent on one's underlying circumstances and those with a relationship with an American don't be surprised to see a denial of a Tourist Visa application at the US Embassy here in Bangkok, Thailand.