There’s been a fantastic glut of people waiting for visa appointments at US embassies around the world since Covid brought it all to a standstill in 2020.
In reading many of the replies, it seems that most here aren’t aware that every visa issued by the Americans requires a fair bit of paperwork as well as an in-person interview at the embassy or consulate. I’m certain that there simply isn’t the availability to get everyone in for interviews and that the American foreign service has only been minimally engaged by their federation to assist in this.
In short, Covid created a massive backlog in the visa appointment process and the American government doesn’t seemed to be very involved in trying to find extra appointments for athletes due to compete in Eugene.
There are several factors involved. The first is the wait time to get a visa. As the application is done in the athletes home country and so the time can vary dramatically from a couple of weeks to several months. According to the US Government in general, the B-1 visa processing time is about three months (90 days) for USCIS to process work permit applications but has been taking longer recently, often 4,1/2-5 months
If the US decide your visa application requires an in person interview then the wait period goes through the roof: 685 days for an interview appointment in Kenya, 195 days in England. I would think though that international athletes would not be required to sit an interview.
The second problem is while you apply for your visa you have to give the US embassy your passport. Again the US Government states: The passport of the applicant will remain at the US embassy/consulate that he/she has applied at, during the whole period of visa processing.
If you remember a few weeks ago Ethiopia wanted to stop all their athletes leaving the country and competing abroad prior to the WCs. This was almost certainly visa related. If the athlete is in Europe his passport is also in Europe and not at the US Embassy in Addis Ababa.
Some countries realise this applying for visas can be a problem for frequent travellers and so allow concurrent passports, Britain allows up to three concurrent passports. I have not been able to find out if Kenya or Ethiopia are amongst those that allow concurrent passports. I would imaging that any competent athlete's agent will push for concurrent passports for their athletes if they are available.
These sound like questions that an athletics journalist might ask of experts. Let's hope there are some athletics journalists around.
International events require lawyers to provide foreign guest information to the US State Department. This was not done. Consequently each natl body had to figure out how to work with the US Embassy on their own. They never had to do that since it's always provided by the host organizer. As a result it appears many guest will be scratched.
I've been involved with bringing foreign teams into the US, for a tournament, almost all the issues we have had were with the athlete not the us. My guess is that their country's body did not have the proper paperwork or the athlete did not provide the proper paperwork/info
Because U.S. immigration is incredibly strict and it's well known customs and border checks are really difficult. The Nigerian relay teams were denied entry to the U.S. last year for a training camp. Many sports people are denied entry every year and it never makes the news. You only know about this instance because you follow the sport.
Visas are not tickets, you can't just give 50 visas and ask the federations to decide who travels. That is a totally ridiculous you would even think that is what would happen. There is a question on the ESTA application form which asks "Do you seek to engage in or have you ever engaged in terrorist activities, espionage, sabotage, or genocide?" (as if someone would admit to this on the form!). That is the sort of bureaucracy you have to pass.
The US visa process is a mess right now. Needed to get a visa in 2020 for the US and it took forever to come through even being sponsored by a large multinational and having their lawyers take care of everything. I know an athlete who was trying to get a P1 visa to train with a group in the states for this year who just gave up trying to get it as it was taking too long and it didn't make sense anymore waiting to get in.
Covid has created massive backlogs - other posters have identified some of these issues already. It is not a US specific issue though. A bunch of athletes couldn't compete in the Birmingham Diamond League due to visa issues. Heck, multiple members of team staff for the Montreal F1 Grand Prix didn't get their visas in time, and that's despite the stupid amount of money F1 teams have to throw at problems.
I have to agree with another poster - right now the age of seamless international travel is, maybe not over, but on pause. Between visa slow downs and airport chaos, you're a fool to be booking just-in-time travel plans.
The Federal Government of the USA has proven repeatedly they cannot manage a neighborhood lemonade stand, let alone a pandemic, oil / gas shortage, supply chain issues and the list goes on. Now we're expecting they and the crackpots at USATF to work together to ensure the athletes who have qualified can get here to compete? The country team managers should have just paid a flat rate to the cartel to get these teams across via the SW borders.
How could you give a set of visas without checking the individuals when you have specific criminal and terrorist lists you have to check before approving anyone and how could you vet the athletes six months out when the teams aren't chosen until one month out? The fact is that attrition and limits on gov't spending have put the state department in a months long backlog for visas and passports. Try scheduling an appointment for a rush (one week) passport and you'll see what it is like. Be sure to call at exactly 8 a.m. EDT or 5 a.m. PDT to try, because within ten minutes they'll be gone and you'll have to try the next day for the next batch. Those who are paying companies hundreds for them are using autodialing programs to get in and then reserving all the appt.s before anyone using normal phones can get in (they dropped the online appt system because they were using bots to grab the spots). Until Congress appropriates more money to them and IRS and so on, we'll have a non-working gov't.
Non of this is should apply. This is the World Champs. We invited htem to our country. If i'm the ambassador to Kenya, I'm making this my #1 priority that Omanyala gets here.
You clearly don't understand how U.S. embassies function, and what their priorities are. The U.S. Ambassador to Kenya has a series of priorities, and getting a Kenyan athlete to America on time for a track meet is not even in the top 20.
The embassy's top priority is the safety and security of American citizens in Kenya. This includes American citizen services (passports, consular reports of birth abroad, welfare and whereabouts cases) immediately, and more strategically, working with Kenyan partners on key regional security issues (Somalia, piracy, terrorist cells, regional stability). Non-immigrant visa appointments are important, but not mission critical.
As for zcxvzxcv's note on Congressional appropriations: money for overseas consular operations comes from visa application fees paid for by foreigners who want to come to the United States.