Tamizdat Submits Public Comment Regarding Extended Use of “Extreme Vetting” Form DS-5535
On May 29th, Tamizdat submitted our public comment to the Department of State on their proposal to extend the use of the form DS-5535, first introduced under former president Trump’s “extreme vetting” program.
In the attached short public comment letter we object to the use of the form DS-5535 in its entirety. As some background, the question of when an interviewing consular officer should issue the DS-5535 to a visa applicant is at the officer’s discretion, and the practice is prone to discriminatory abuse; the form is predominantly used by non-immigrant visa units at U.S. consulates in Africa and the Middle East, where its use rarely correlates to legitimate security concerns. When the DS-5535 form is required, the processing time of a visa application often increases from approximately one week to more than six months, which has led to processing delays that have impacted, canceled, or delayed tours for numerous world-renowned artists. Additionally, the questions requiring applicants to provide all social media handles, phone numbers, and email addresses used during the last five years chill free speech, and the government has not provided any evidence of how it is using this information or how this information protects national security interests.
May 2024 Tamizdat Public Statement on DS-5535