quoo

I realize this. Just all the articles I've read have just said this is for the EU not specifically the Schengen area which is what has me concerned.

Ber2dca

If the EU actually made US citizens apply for a 'proper visa', you know it'd just kill the VWP on the other side as well. There would be retaliation with 100% certainty.

I don't think it'd be that popular anymore at that point in the core EU countries. Let's just say the sentiments regarding Bulgarians and Romanians among the populations in the 'old' EU are at best a mixed bag. It'd be a tough sell for the Irish or Austrians that they can't visit the US easily anymore because it's policy that the East Balkans folks must be allowed to go to the U.S. without any checks in place. Allowing citizens from those countries without checks into the rest of Europe was controversial enough with people.

Now for that and many other reasons, I don't expect much to happen here.

WilcoRoger

Surprisingly enough they could pair Budapest and Hungary

If anything at all comes out of this, it won't happen this decade... and hardly will brexit. So in June it will be business as usual

quoo

Thanks for the reassurance. While logically, all these things make sense (and not to make this too political), I never really saw brexit coming either so I'm not really trusting my instincts on these things.

bwiadca

I don't understand that. Netherlands citizens get 16% refusal rate and they can come to US visa free, while Polish citizens have 5% refusal rate and they can't come to US visa free.
How does it work?

iamflyer

If true my first thought is that given the vast majority of Dutch citizens entering the US do not apply for a visa, those who apply for visa likely represent a much different segment of the population than Poles who apply for a visa

televisor

I'm very happy about this. It's about time the EU retaliated against the US for ignoring the letter of the visa waiver policies. Now the EU motivation is obvious: this should hopefully push the US into actually following agreements for once (it will likely fail, but it's worth it on principle).

I've actually seen racist treatment at US embassies during Visa interview: as a brit (living outside the UK, in a higher income country), my Visa interview was a formality. Eastern europeans, with jobs and residence in exactly the same country, who were applying for short term business visas to visit other branches of their company, were treated rudely and suspiciously: every single one was told to supply yet more documentation _and_ that they would have to wait _months_ to get their visa processed. (And life in this specific country is _much_ nicer than in the US, which the embassy officials are well aware of.) Honestly it was ridiculous.

Also, you are conflating multiple issues here: visa free travel, vs the right to live and work in other EU states. Visa free travel reciprocity between the EU and new states existed well before the EU happened. E.g. I could travel visa-free to poland (and vice-versa) well before the EU happened, somehow the rest of the EU never had any issues with that. I can't be certain about Bulgaria and Romania, but I have a hazy memory of travelling to Bulgaria without a Visa, pre-EU. Yes, some people are unhappy with EU right to live/work, but that's _completely_ independent of what this thread is about. Moreover, Visa-free travel didn't see an influx of "undocumented" eastern europeans into western europe.

catocony

That's a weird post. First of all, the US isn't ignoring the letter of it's own visa waiver policies. It's done on a per-country basis. From a US perspective, the EU is not a sovereign country but at best, a confederation of independent states. Thus, immigration policies set for a particular EU country could be different from a different EU country.

As far as the EU retaliating, the US won't really lose much. I've had to deal with a number of "reciprocity" visa issues with Brasil over the years. I understand that the Brasileros want to be viewed as a world power and equal to everyone else. However, they lose a lot of US tourism and business because of the visa process and cost they make US citizens go through to visit.

If France, Germany and Italy want to make one to two million of it's citizens apply, in person, for a US tourist visa before they go to the US, that will be a very hard sell. As Ber2dca stated, they're not going to risk the wrath of their citizens who want to visit the US and the drop in US tourist money just to prove a point. Especially when that point is a few countries in Eastern Europe. They might rally around Spain or the Netherlands, they won't rally around Bulgaria and Croatia. They like they ease they have coming here, they like the ease that US citizens can travel there and spend dollars.

bwiadca

What about US citizens applying for EU visa in USA? I would love that.
- You have to go to the embassy in person
- Wait in line
- Pay for the visa $160 (or whatever the rate is)
- Meet with the consul
- Show the consul invitation from the person inviting you from EU
- Show the letter from your employer
- Show your bank statements from the last 6 months
- Show your criminal background check paid by you
- Show all the travel itinerary
- Get denied the visa
- Drive back to Milwaukee...


I was denied visa to USA when I was 15yo. I was a "risk" for the consul.
Couldn't visit my sister during school summer vacations...

catocony

Again, if the point is to stick it to the US, it's a case of cutting off your nose to spite your face. More EU citizens come to the US (about 15 million in 2015) than US citizens go to EU countries (about 12.5 million in 2015). There is very little for the EU to gain in this scenario but much to lose. For the US, there's very little to lose.

bwiadca

Ok, so let's stick with the current situation, and just ban residents of Oklahoma, Arkansas, Nebraska, Rhode Island and Hawaii from coming to EU visa free.
Would that be fair?

catocony

Seeing as none of those states are independent countries, your scenario would not apply. Are you under the impression that Belgium and Bulgaria are the same sovereign nation, or just trying to be snarky? Brits are real bad at snark, so I hope not.

bwiadca

Not being snarky. Just fed up with the US policy towards Poland.
Bush Sr. lied to Poland
Clinton lied to Poland
Bush Jr. lied to Poland
Obama lied to Poland
and now Trump (only in the office less then 2 months) also lied to Poland.

Canada removed visas to Polish citizens about 5-6 years ago. Is Canada flooded with illegal workers from Poland? If they did, they would change the visa requirements.

US government's mind is still in the cold war era. They need new representatives with fresh ideas while the world is spinning. Not somebody who keeps the same job for 50-60 years 'serving the country'.

It pisses me off greatly that Poland is still on the US short stick list.

I hope that this new EU visa policy will take effect ASAP. Maybe then some people in US will realize that the world is not revolving around USA.

catocony

A number of former Soviet satellites and even Soviet states are part of the Visa Waiver Program. They all met the 3% threshold. Poland hasn't. It's as simple as that.

The EU is spineless, so of course they won't implement anything retaliatory on travel. Will they whine and complain? Sure, but that's been the European standard for 71.5 years. Whine and complain, act insulted, then cave quickly when things get tough. That will the same in this case.

hfly

This all means nothing. The original 12, not to mention none of the expansion states such as Slovenia, Lithuania, etc etc are going to risk the wrath of their citizens for a tit for tat spat with the US. The US has easy to follow rules, get your violators under 3% and you enter the VWP. Despite the fact that Bush Jr. was dying to give the Poles VWP and was willing to accept a 5% rate, the Poles could still not meet it. As for bwiadca, how many illegal Poles are just in Chicago? Is it 20,000? 200,000? not to mention the rest of the United States? How many illegal Americans are there in Warsaw, let alone Wroclaw? Is it 50? 200?

The EU needs to be real careful about this one as if they play it wrong it can directly lead to a greater breakup of the bloc.

Lastly regarding reciprocity and the like, someone above mentioned Brazil. The Brazilians like to go on about that word, this despite the fact that little that they have ever done has had much to do with reciprocity and most negative factors have always been instigated by Brazil. How many illegals in Pompano Beach Florida, or Jersey City, and I am not even talking major places. In 1992 there were estimated to be 400,000 Brazilians living illegally in the US. There were estimated to be 2,000 US citizens living illegally in Brazil.