April 2007
Border Line Prevention
by Lucile Scott
Mapping Bush’s change to the immigration ban
President Bush’s announcement, on December 1, World AIDS Day, to let HIV positive foreign visitors into the country was greeted with cheers, but left advocates full of questions. Currently, positive foreigners can enter the U.S. if they receive a special waiver—or illegally hide their status. Those actually granted a waiver get a stamp on their passport forever branding them as positive. The announcement did not clarify if the stamp will still be issued or if short-term visitors will no longer have to disclose at all. (All positive people seeking residency are still banned.) More specifics are expected by March 1. However, Adam Francouer of Immigration Equality believes that any substantial shift will require a new law, not just a regulatory waiver. He remains skeptical if even the new Democratic Congress would make such a change. “Evidence shows that the ban protects neither public health nor coffers,” he says. “But there is a lot of misinformation about HIV out there.”
