{"id":392398,"date":"2026-01-07T04:31:07","date_gmt":"2026-01-07T04:31:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/392398\/"},"modified":"2026-01-07T04:31:07","modified_gmt":"2026-01-07T04:31:07","slug":"us-adds-more-nations-including-venezuela-to-costly-visa-bond-policy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/392398\/","title":{"rendered":"US adds more nations, including Venezuela, to costly visa bond policy"},"content":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON, Jan 6 (Reuters) – President Donald Trump’s<\/a> administration has put 25 more countries on a list of nations whose citizens could be required to post bonds of up to $15,000 to apply for entry into the U.S., the State Department website, opens new tab<\/a> showed on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

The list mostly included countries from Africa, Latin America and South Asia. It had a total of 38 countries as of Tuesday. The policy for the newly added nations will go into effect on January 21, the State Department website said.<\/p>\n

Sign up here.<\/a><\/p>\n

Venezuela, whose toppled leader Nicolas Maduro<\/a> was seized by U.S. forces over the weekend and brought to New York, was also included in the list.<\/p>\n

“Any citizen or national traveling on a passport issued by one of these countries, who is found otherwise eligible for a B1\/B2 visa, must post a bond for $5,000, $10,000, or $15,000,” the State Department website said, adding the amount was determined at the time of the visa interview.<\/p>\n

Applicants must agree to the terms of the bond through the U.S. Treasury Department’s online payment platform, Pay.gov, the State Department said.<\/p>\n

A State Department pilot program was launched<\/a> in August with an initial list of nations.<\/p>\n

The U.S. government has said the bonds seek to deter visitors from overstaying their visas intended for tourism or business purposes.<\/p>\n

Since taking office last January, Trump, a Republican, has pursued a hard-line immigration policy, involving an aggressive deportation drive<\/a>, revocations of visas and green cards<\/a> and screening of social media posts and past speeches<\/a> of immigrants.<\/p>\n

Human rights groups have widely condemned Trump’s immigration and travel-related policies, saying they curb due process guarantees and free speech. Trump and his allies say the policies seek to improve domestic security.<\/p>\n

Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Washington; Editing by Thomas Derpinghaus<\/p>\n

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles., opens new tab<\/a><\/p>\n

Purchase Licensing Rights<\/a><\/a><\/p>\n

Kanishka Singh is a breaking news reporter for Reuters in Washington DC, who primarily covers US politics and national affairs in his current role. His past breaking news coverage has spanned across a range of topics like the Black Lives Matter movement; the US elections; the 2021 Capitol riots and their follow up probes; the Brexit deal; US-China trade tensions; the NATO withdrawal from Afghanistan; the COVID-19 pandemic; and a 2019 Supreme Court verdict on a religious dispute site in his native India.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WASHINGTON, Jan 6 (Reuters) – President Donald Trump’s administration has put 25 more countries on a list of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":392399,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[190293,23,182548,3995,184327,16545,184705,183099,183092,184708,184707,28090,184328,182531,190292,184947,100804,182549,3,183097,184709,183077,37215,190291,184704,184433,184592,184712,21,19,22,20,25,24,29921,183085],"class_list":{"0":"post-392398","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-united-states","8":"tag-afr","9":"tag-america","10":"tag-amers","11":"tag-asia","12":"tag-asxpac","13":"tag-civ","14":"tag-cwp","15":"tag-destocatpm","16":"tag-destoustpm","17":"tag-destouswdm","18":"tag-dip","19":"tag-emea","20":"tag-emrg","21":"tag-gen","22":"tag-imm","23":"tag-intag","24":"tag-latam","25":"tag-namer","26":"tag-news","27":"tag-packageus-top-news","28":"tag-packageworld-news","29":"tag-pol","30":"tag-potus","31":"tag-rulesimmigration","32":"tag-rulestrump","33":"tag-samer","34":"tag-sasia","35":"tag-secur","36":"tag-united-states","37":"tag-united-states-of-america","38":"tag-unitedstates","39":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","40":"tag-us","41":"tag-usa","42":"tag-ve","43":"tag-wash"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/392398","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=392398"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/392398\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/392399"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=392398"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=392398"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=392398"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}