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Comment by throw3838 | Hacker News Reader

Seems fair. I am EU citizen, can go to US visa free, but ESTA is required. It should be the same from the other side.

And US limits countries I can visit. Iran is great holiday destination, but after visit I would need US visa.

Usually people get a second passport if they have to visit Iran and the US. This is legal in the EU and a somewhat standard workaround.

Might be legal in the EU but it’s a crime in the US.

Edit: a crime to use it as a “workaround” (i.e. lie) to US customs, that is

The US can also issue its citizens a second passport book for similar purposes.

I meant that it is not legal to use a second passport as a workaround to support a lie about your travel history. Lying to enter the US is illegal regardless of the number of passports you have.

That's true. This only affects those who have visited Iran, Iraq, North Korea, Sudan, Syria, Libya, Somalia and Yemen on or after March 1, 2011, and they're still not disqualified, but I do understand the frustration at the inconvenience (although none of this will affect me since I am a US and EU citizen).

You can get a second US passport with limited validity. Great when you need to apply for visas but also have other international travel going on. And sometimes it's convenient for hiding visa stamps of one country from another country.

What exactly is a crime in the US?

Any kind of “workaround” for telling the truth to customs officials.

Have you travelled to, or been present in Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia, North Korea or Yemen on or after March 1, 2011?

Using a second passport, fake passport, alias, fake glasses and moustache doesnt make a differnce to the answer to that question. Its not even a workaround.

The US asks if you have been to places like Iraq, Iran, Libya etc since 2011. If you do, you can’t ESTA, you need a visa.

Work would like me to go to Iraq, which is fine. They’ll pay for me to get a US Visa too.

Trouble is in 20 years time when I want to go to NY for my kids wedding or whatever, I’ll still have to answer “yes” to the “I visited Iraq” question, and I won’t be working for the company that sent me there, so I’d have to go for the long arduous process of prostrating myself at the US embassy to beg for a visa, incurring a large expense to do so. Just because the stamp isn’t in my active passport doesn’t mean I can answer “no” to the question

It’s not like Israel, where the stamp would cause problems but they don’t ask (or the other way round where an Israeli stamp would cause problems going to Iran).

Even when I apply for a visa and have to list every country (often in a comically small box with like 100 characters max length), like with India, it only asks “what could tries have you visited in the last 10 years”

I wonder how that works for people that went there because their country joined one neocon middle eastern venture or another. Does it count if you went there for invasion purposes?

Nope, only in some EU countries, e.g. Germany.

In Portugual you really need a very good reason for a 2nd passport and being convenient for tourism isn't one.

I have two because I provided a letter from my organisation backing me having two as I travelled frequently and often had a passport away at an embassy waiting for a visa and need to be able to travel at short notice.

Since then I’ve reduced the number of visa based countries I’ve needed to go to (more have gone electronic), and countries have reduced stamps, throw in covid, and it’s to the point that I doubt I’ll fill my passports up before the 10 years has expired. It’s a shame really, the stamps in past passports are a great momento, but places like Hong Kong, Israel, Canada, Australia have all stopped stamping in the last few years.

Guess the lack of stamps means record holding has moved from the passport into the cloud. While the distributed record keeping was certainly more privacy friendly, the new method makes it certainly easier for nation states.

I don’t think you need a special reason to have both an ID card and a passport. The ID card is only valid inside Europe though.

ID and Passwort aren't optional in Portugal, and even in Europe there are countries that don't take ID cards.

Not in the European Union as that is not allowed:

https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/dir/2004/38/oj

> Without prejudice to the provisions on travel documents applicable to national border controls, Member States shall grant Union citizens leave to enter their territory with a valid identity card or passport

Europe and European Union are not the same thing.

So, what are the exceptions you are pointing at?

Europe is composed by 44 countries, a subset of those countries are part of European Union, more precisely 27, which also makes the Schengen Area with agreementes with external EU countries like Switzerland.

It is an exercise in geography to track down down which 16 countries don't care you have an ID card.

How about you just state your point.

What? You need a US visa to visit Iran as a European?

No. Foreign nationals from countries (including most of Europe) that normally have access to the US through the Visa Waiver Program and ESTA lose that access if they visit Iran or a few other countries. They thereafter need to go through the full US visa application process if they want to go to the US.

One of the cases where at least in Germany you can get a second passport without problems. Another example would be travel to Israel and Arabian countries.

Still requires you to lie on the ESTA form, which is not necessarily a good idea. (i.e. if you lie and get caught, that's worse than going through the visa process)

Sure, simple answer: don't carry both passports at the same time. Pretty sure Iran (an the other countries on the US blacklist) don't exchange travel information with the US.

and don't appear on any travel manifests other countries share, and don't turn up on any other tracking, and ...

Two different passports, only carry the right one: easy. And unless US border police is checking any, potential, Iranian travel data the NSA collected I don't see the problem. Confidently telling those border police officers you've never been to Iran seems to be the trickiest part. But hell, it works just perfectly fine for everyone travelling to Israel and any Arabian country, so...

No it doesn’t. Israel doesn’t routinely ask you if you’ve been to Iran, if they did, you answer tru fully if you know what’s good for you. Same if you go to Saudi.

The US specifically asks you if you have travelled to those countries. You can either lie, and that’s a serious risk at being jailed, deported, banned from ever going again, and having issues going to other countries, or you can tell the truth.

No photos of yourself there, no references to having travelled there anywhere in the Internet….

The question at the border is "Have you ever visited Iran?", Not "Do you have a stamp for Iran in this passport?".

Since passenger lists on flights around the world are pretty much public information, the US immigration services will know exactly where you have visited in the past, and could totally put you in prison for lying when answering the question.

> The question at the border is "Have you ever visited Iran?"

Is that something only people on ESTA get asked? Never heard of people on visas being asked that.

They ask that questions also during student or work visa issuance - and even during the greencard (adjustment of status) and naturalization processes. They don't ask it every time you enter with these visas or statuses however.

But as a US citizen you will never be asked. And better yet if you are a dual citizen like me. Then you can travel on your other passport to the places the US finds to be undesirable.

I think green card and naturalization ask about travel in the last few years. But they don't ask about travel prior to that, and they don't ask about Iran specifically.

True - I think it was 10 (or was it 7?) year of travel history, but I'm sure Iran would raise some flags.

The same is in Norway, although one have to justify it. For example one cannot get a visa to China if one has a stamp from Taiwan. So if one needs to travel to both often, then one can apply for the second passport.

I don’t remember China asking if I’ve been to Taiwan. I’d be surprised too - there’s direct flights between the two. That said I normally visit China on a 168 hour transit visa and fly via Hong Kong, Tokyo or Seoul rather than the hassle of applying for a visa.

> For example one cannot get a visa to China if one has a stamp from Taiwan

I am quite sure that this is not true.

I think they mean that going to Iran voids their eligibility to travel to America in the future without a visa.

I think you need a visa to go to the US if you've been to Iran.

If they want to visit the US with a Iranian stamp on their passport.

If you have an Iranian passport stamp, I would expect very pointed questions at US immigration. I can't find a specific citation that says you need a visa if you've been to Iran, but I wouldn't be surprised if that was the case.

Fun fact - in Poland you can get a second passport for such situations.

You use one passport to visit Iran (etc), and the other to visit US, Israel and so on.

I never needed this, but it’s good to have such an option.

Yes, but if US ever finds out, it could get pretty nasty. US entry ban is pretty limiting career move for programmer.

Just no.

That’s fine for visiting Israel (which rarely stamps nowadays) and Iran.

The US specifically asks “have you ever been to Iran”. You can lie, then get arrested in the US, or you can say “yes”, and have to go through the time and expense to get a US visa. Forever.

> If you have an Iranian passport stamp, I would expect very pointed questions at US immigration

Or any number of things. I know of multiple French citizens born in "suspect" for the Americans places like Algiers and Beirut who have had extensive questioning on arrival at the US, including the mindbogglingly stupid " why were you born there?".

That honestly doesn’t sound like a dumb question to me. People don’t just get randomly born abroad for no reason, it’s typically because their families were doing something there.

It kind of is though, because Algeria was a part of France until 1962, and there are millions of people of Algerian descent who have French citizenship.

Like living there?

Potentially. But, families can also travel to places where they don't live. They can also engage in activities that are of interest to customs officials, regardless of their residency status.

Rather than guessing, it's prudent to simply ask the question, no?

Well when a mummy and a daddy love each other very much...

Its pretty stupid having to explain that to a 50 year old.

I know anAmerican born in Tehran who is white. It is a minefield.

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