4 ms·

IANAL but it doesn't make sense that she would be banned over something that is legally not prostitution. She should have a lawyer file a court case. That's

IANAL but it doesn't make sense that she would be banned over something that is legally not prostitution. She should have a lawyer file a court case. That's certainly not a "crime of moral turpitude." And prostitutes are banned for 10 years, and waivers are possible. Details are here: https://fam.state.gov/fam/09FAM/09FAM030203.html https://fam.state.gov/fam/09FAM/09FAM030203.html

skissane 4y ago
> She should have a lawyer file a court case. IANAL either but court challenges to visitor visa decisions pretty much never succeed. The Courts are so deferential to the Executive on that topic, immigration attorneys will tell you it is a waste of your time and money even filing the case. The one thing which can work sometimes, is if you can get your own government to raise the issue through diplomatic channels. However, unless you are someone very important, your own government probably can’t be bothered, and won’t see it as something worth spending diplomatic capital on.
csydas 4y ago
Also not a lawyer, but reading the document, the language for a lot of this document is incredibly subjective and broad. Neverminding the fact that immigration office workers generally don't have to justify their position, very likely sex workers who never actually have physical contact with their clients would be subject to the conditions of ineligibility because of fairly prudish conditions on the immigration document: (3) (U) Crimes Committed Against Person, Family Relationship, And Sexual Morality: I think the main sections that might apply would be prostitution and lewdness. Prostitution doesn't require physical contact as I get it [0], and even acts meant to "satisfy a sexual desire" are counted. Lewdness I cannot find a specific definition of with a very quick search, but in general the language on what I can find focuses more on the public nature of "indecent" elements. As I understand from the document later on you don't even need a conviction for the immigration officers to reject you, an admission is enough (see section 9 FAM 302.3-2(B)(4) (U) Admitting to Crimes Involving Moral Turpitude) To be very clear, I think that the ruling on this case and such rules in general are absolutely ridiculous and puritanical, and should be removed as they are overly broad and group persons who don't bring risk with those who bring risk. I don't know the history of these rules, but I can imagine that a modern defense of the rules likely would include discussion points on preventing "sex trafficking", even though the person from the article likely is not related to sex trafficking at all. I'm not sure a wrongfully rejected application for immigration is something you can sue over in general, and even if they could, I suppose that with the current law/rules presented by your document, it would be pretty easy to spin VRChat Sex workers as ineligible due to the extremely broad categorizations used for Sexual Morality. Again, I must stress that I think including such clauses against "sexual morality" is very stupid and only serve as a means for individuals to weaponize their own agendas/morals legally speaking. The conditions for violating Sexual Morality even mention bigamy for some reason, and I honestly just cannot understand how that would be considered a concern for an immigration application. I have no idea how it works for non-US Citizens if they want to sue the US government, but as a layperson I understand that even US Citizens cannot sue the government outright, there are a lot of caveats for the lawsuit to even be applicable. This is really a sad example of poorly written law that punishes persons needlessly, and the persons punished likely have very little recourse :/ 0 - https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/prostitution https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/prostitution
pydry 4y ago
The issue here isn't really that the border guards made a "mistake", but the fact that suspicion of being a prostitute alone is enough to warrant banning entry.

skissane 4y ago

> She should have a lawyer file a court case. IANAL either but court challenges to visitor visa decisions pretty much never succeed. The Courts are so deferential to the Executive on that topic, immigration attorneys will tell you it is a waste of your time and money even filing the case. The one thing which can work sometimes, is if you can get your own government to raise the issue through diplomatic channels. However, unless you are someone very important, your own government probably can’t be bothered, and won’t see it as something worth spending diplomatic capital on.

csydas 4y ago

Also not a lawyer, but reading the document, the language for a lot of this document is incredibly subjective and broad. Neverminding the fact that immigration office workers generally don't have to justify their position, very likely sex workers who never actually have physical contact with their clients would be subject to the conditions of ineligibility because of fairly prudish conditions on the immigration document: (3) (U) Crimes Committed Against Person, Family Relationship, And Sexual Morality: I think the main sections that might apply would be prostitution and lewdness. Prostitution doesn't require physical contact as I get it [0], and even acts meant to "satisfy a sexual desire" are counted. Lewdness I cannot find a specific definition of with a very quick search, but in general the language on what I can find focuses more on the public nature of "indecent" elements. As I understand from the document later on you don't even need a conviction for the immigration officers to reject you, an admission is enough (see section 9 FAM 302.3-2(B)(4) (U) Admitting to Crimes Involving Moral Turpitude) To be very clear, I think that the ruling on this case and such rules in general are absolutely ridiculous and puritanical, and should be removed as they are overly broad and group persons who don't bring risk with those who bring risk. I don't know the history of these rules, but I can imagine that a modern defense of the rules likely would include discussion points on preventing "sex trafficking", even though the person from the article likely is not related to sex trafficking at all. I'm not sure a wrongfully rejected application for immigration is something you can sue over in general, and even if they could, I suppose that with the current law/rules presented by your document, it would be pretty easy to spin VRChat Sex workers as ineligible due to the extremely broad categorizations used for Sexual Morality. Again, I must stress that I think including such clauses against "sexual morality" is very stupid and only serve as a means for individuals to weaponize their own agendas/morals legally speaking. The conditions for violating Sexual Morality even mention bigamy for some reason, and I honestly just cannot understand how that would be considered a concern for an immigration application. I have no idea how it works for non-US Citizens if they want to sue the US government, but as a layperson I understand that even US Citizens cannot sue the government outright, there are a lot of caveats for the lawsuit to even be applicable. This is really a sad example of poorly written law that punishes persons needlessly, and the persons punished likely have very little recourse :/ 0 - https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/prostitution https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/prostitution

pydry 4y ago

The issue here isn't really that the border guards made a "mistake", but the fact that suspicion of being a prostitute alone is enough to warrant banning entry.