Often, that's how it goes. More rarely, there's affirmative acknowledgment.

i don't get you. i referred to the tourist visa in my original post and said it required intent to return foreign. i have since edited it for clarity. i have no issue. i agree that the visa function and the inspection/admission functions should remain separate and the DHS is not the right place for the visa function. they tried to take it away from State after 911 when it was a somewhat neglected and under resourced activity. it has gotten a lot better since.

It was a reference to the thread title, that's all.

visa revocation
 

“They promised to look into it. They didn’t take him seriously.”
 

... The father, a wealthy businessman named Alhaji Umaru Mutallab, had urgently sought help from American and Nigerian security officials when cellphone text messages from his son revealed that he was in Yemen and had become a fervent radical.

A family cousin quoted the father warning American officials in Nigeria: “Look at the texts he’s sending. He’s a security threat.”

The cousin said: “They promised to look into it. They didn’t take him seriously.” ...

Hubris? The Nigerian Security people refer him to the CIA and they don't take him seriously? This is not your run of the mill poison pen.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/31/us/31terror.html?hp

How do you send a Visas Viper tagging a potential terrorist and not revoke his visa? It should be automatic. Or don't bother to send the Visas Viper.

It isn't automatic.

The way the process is set up when this kind of cable or other dispatch message is sent is that the decision to revoke the visa takes place in the DC-area as part of a process that initially or eventually ends up having cross-agency references or to enable cross-agency references for a variety of purposes. The process functioned as it was designed to work/fail.

I said it should be automatic. The State Department could and should have revoked the visa. It is self evident that if you have reached the threshold where you recommend someone for the terrorist list that you would take any valid visa away before he uses it to do harm. Was this only a half hearted Viper massage? CIA says it was.