When I returned to the USA and went through customs I asked them about it and told them I had been denied entry and they blamed Argentina (which contradicts directly what I was told in Argentina) so the question is thi


I got this kind of crap when cops in Florida lost/stole my passport after
a frivolous arrest. Bottom line, bureaucrats love to throw you into
a catch22 mess and then blame the other bureaucracy. They get off on it.

Nephew denied entry
 

My nephew was just denied access to Argentina/Buenos Aires this AM.

US Citizen, no Police issues anywhere or ever, cash in his pocket and return ticket.

The only problem was he knew the name but not the address of the Hotel he was staying in, and didn't know the name of the college my daughter is attending down there.

He was going down to meet my sister and visit my daughter for a 2 week vacation.

They gave him no explanation, just put him on the first plane out.

Really looks like they were just screwing with an American because they had nothing else to do at 1:30 AM

Is there any recourse for something like this or is he just SOL?

I feel for you, but just saying as a foreign national here in the USA anytime some one arrives in the USA and does not know the address of the place they are staying they will get issues..

My very first time traveling to the USA back in 2003 I was visiting a mate in San Diego.. He was picking me up from the airport..

On entry at LAX I was asked what the address I was staying at to which I responded NFI.. In the end after much awkwardness the immigration fellow (who now I recognize as a FREAKING LEGEND) said "Sir, if you told me you were staying at the San Diego Hilton I would have no issues" To which I said "I am staying at the San Diego Hilton"

I imagine, that day, if I had gotten the wrong person I would never have been allowed entry and now whenever I have folks visiting me or my institution I thoroughly breif them.

I think your son got the wrong guy. I do not think the Argentinian authorities want to deny anyone.. folks in = money for the country..

Just saying, glass houses.. stones.. yeah..

Not any meaningful, material recourse, unfortunately -- although it may be possible to fix things for a future visit to decrease odds of a repeat denial.

What was his routing into the country?

Just out of curiosity, what is the apparent ethnic and/or religious background(s) of your nephew?

He had proof of reciprocity payment to show the Argentine migration authorities?

I can say for sure that Argentine passport control asks more questions of US citizens now than was the case even four years ago or so. And they've jumped on the paranoia bandwagon of fingerprint and digital photo capture of foreign visitors.

My guess is that the nephew is young (late teens to early 20's) and that may have factored into it. Maybe he didn't have enough cash/credit cards? I don't know.

Third world countries usually don't mind young Americans. Argentina has been repeatedly asking to get back into the Visa Waiver Program. Perhaps they're turning more Americans away in hopes that the State Department will approve Argentina for the program. It's idiotic, but as someone who spent 15 years working and vacationing in Latin America, idiocy is standard operating procedure.

It's always a good idea to have your hotel info printed out. They theoretically could deny you entry because of that.

The kid could have said something stupid, or refused to do something they asked him to do.

I'm curious if he has a job. If he doesn't, they might have thought he was moving there to live/work, notwithstanding the roundtrip ticket.

Post from this expat blog suggest there may be a crackdown going on in Argentina against people who are essentially living there by repeatedly coming and going on tourist visas.


http://baexpats.org/topic/31498-i-wa...try-at-ezeiza/


Maybe the OP got caught up in this, he/she refers to visiting Argentina many times. This wouldn't explain why the USA would have told Argentina not to let him in, if that indeed happened.

I think that part we'll never really know. I wouldn't put it past the customs agent of any country really to claim that it was the other end that said they couldn't come in. It's just too fishy of a story to really believe that it happened. I'm far more willing to believe it was just the customs agent trying to deflect blame so they wouldn't have to deal with it.

And yet the "too fishy of a story" has been reality before -- repeatedly at that.

Wouldn't a phone call be cheaper than an immediate return flight?
 

Having never been in one of these immigration-type situations (other than several hours "delay" in PHX for attempting to enter the US without all my visa papers), wouldn't it be prudent to ask to talk to someone at your consulate to see if the matter could be cleared up? Or is this something that would take too much effort over the phone?

I think I would at least try a phone call before boarding again (assuming the foreign immigration officers are reasonable enough to allow me to call my embassy).

This nearly happened to our boy when he was traveling in Europe. He was visiting friends in Germany. They decided to spend a weekend in London and flew from Bonn to London. On arrival the friends went to the EU line, but our son went to the non-EU line. He was 16, his first international trip and had traveled from the US via AMS without difficulty. He was met at FRA by his host family and there were no issues.

Having been separated from the host family by the EU/nonEU lines in London, the British customs ask him what he was doing in London. He didn't know the itinerary, and told the customs guy so. He was asked if he had traveled alone, and being the dufus he sometimes can be, told customs yes, thinking he meant from the states to Europe. So, being clueless, completely honest, he was told that he was being denied entry and would be sent back to Bonn on the next airplane available. So, he asked if he could talk to his host family waiting on the other side of the exit from where he was. Lights came on, questions were answered, and our now better seasoned traveler was admitted to the UK.

Don't know if Argentina might have been that way, but it sounds like your son is a bit more seasoned and travel smart than ours.

Wait, if you are denied entry into a country, isn't the airline responsible for transporting you back home? What would have happened if you refused to pay a date change fee? :confused:

Interesting, I almost never know the address of the hotel where I am staying, especially if I intend to take a taxi or rent a car (that's what GPS is for!). At best, I would probably be able to look it up in an e-mail. Whenever an entry document asks for the address where I will be staying, I almost always just put "Hilton XXX" or "YYY Sheraton" or whatever is the hotel name.

Such responses to the 'address' question do not work at ports of entry to the USA any more. They have not f:or a few years.

Indeed the U.S. looks for zip codes and is far more forcefully requiring street addresses even in advance of travel but also on arrival. The big US surveillance state players needs more data to have bigger haystacks in which to lose people or in and around which to chase canards.

Migration authorities in Buenos Aires aren't as petty as US authorities about addresses, but they have been asking visitors for way more info on arrival than used to be the case. Even on my visit several days ago to Argentina (just around the time authorities busted a person at a local Internet cafe for possible involvement in a terrorist attack plot in the city), I was held up by the passport control lady when she seemed to be unfamiliar with the Park Hyatt hotel and its location there.