President Trump is signing a Presidential memorandum addressing the the problem of high visa overstays over 10% and has directed Secretaries of State and Homeland Security to find effective ways to combat the visa overstays within 120 days.

One action being considered would suspend or limit entry of individuals from countries with high rates of visa overstays and imposing admission bonds for visa overstayers.

The White house has released a statement that visa overstays are a widespread problem that harm the integrity of our immigration system.

The Presidential memorandum by Donald J Trump, reads

The large numbers of aliens who overstay their period of lawful admission, failing to comply with the terms of a visa or the Visa Waiver Program, place significant strain on Department of Justice and Department of Homeland Security resources, which are currently needed to address the national emergency on our southern border.

• As of March 2019, there were over 415,000 individuals in the United States suspected to still be in the United States after overstaying their nonimmigrant visas in fiscal year (FY) 2018.
• Twenty countries have overstay rates of more than 10 percent—some with rates as high as 20, 30, or 40 percent.
• Countries not part of the Visa Waiver Program accounted for more than 300,000 total overstays in FY 2018.

DHS requires Visa Waiver Program (VWP) countries with an overstay rate exceeding two percent to implement public awareness campaigns that warn against overstaying visas.

The Secretary of State shall engage with the governments of countries with a total overstay rate greater than 10 percent in the combined B-1 and B-2 nonimmigrant visa category based on the Department of Homeland Security Fiscal Year 2018 Entry/Exit Overstay Report.

Admission Bonds.  The Secretary of State and the Secretary of Homeland Security shall take steps to develop measures required for imposing admission bonds as a means for improving compliance with the terms and conditions of nonimmigrant visas.  The Secretaries shall provide a status report to the President within 120 days of the date of this memorandum.

In 2013,  UK home office abandoned £3,000 visa security bond for  high risk overseas visitors to the UK.

DHS Overstay report 2018

According to the visa overstay report published by DHS for 2018, several african countries had visa overstays over the minimum of 10% for B1/B2 categories

• Dijbouti – 44%
• Chad – 33%
• Burundi – 21.5%
• Eritrea – 24%
• Yemen – 27%
• Syria – 17%
• Palau – 17%
• Angola – 15%
• Nigeria – 15%
• South Sudan – 15%
• Cape Verde – 11.9%
• Bhutan – 13%
• Afghanistan – 12.9%
• Georgia – 10.7%
• Laos – 10%

VWP countries

These visa waiver program countries are required to main below 2% overstay rate

The FY 2018 VWP countries’ total overstay rate is 0.41 percent of the VWP countries expected departures. For the FY2018, none of the VWP countries had overstay rate above 2% and dropped significantly.

• Portugal – 1.8%
• Spain – 1.1%
• Chile – 1.49%
• Lithuania – 1.3%
• Greece/Hungary – 1.26%