Help me out here. So a US citizen who has been convicted of crime AND who has served their sentence in full is to be further punished by having permanently diminished ability to successfully reunite with foreign relatives in the US? And to top it off, this seems to be something that will make life more difficult for those US citizens who have never been convicted of a crime yet are petitioning on behalf of relatives who are foreign nationals.

IIRC, this is a result of the well-intentiond "think of the children" campaign. However, it seems like a sweeping "solution" to something that requires a better strategy to deal with than this kind of blanket implementation. [This aspect of the Adam Walsh law that triggered this, if my understanding on the matter is correct (and it may not be), was trying to prevent child abusers from bringing in relatives who were abused by them abroad and may then be further abused in the US if granted an immigration visa.]

So a 16-year old convicted of pinching the rear-end of two 15-year olds would have his/her future ability to reunite with family members even decades after a conviction severely diminished if not eliminated under this? Wow.