section_path: Legal issues/Visa overstay
section_name: Visa overstay
paragraph_text: Visa overstay
  
  Unlike illegal entry (which is a criminal offense in the United States), it is not a criminal offense for an alien to enter the United States legally and then overstay his or her visa. A visa overstay is a civil violation dealt with through proceedings in immigration court. A 2006 Pew Hispanic Center study showed that some 45% of unauthorized migrants entered the US legally and then remained in the US without authorization following the expiration of their visa. A person who overstays a visa is subject only to the civil penalties of deportation or removal and restrictions for future applications for another US visa; under provisions of Section 212 of the Immigration and Nationality Act, as amended by 1996 legislation, an alien who "voluntarily departs the United States after being unlawfully present for more than 180 consecutive days but less than 1 year" is subject to a three-year bar to readmission to the United States, and an alien who "departs (voluntarily or involuntarily) the United States after being unlawfully present for 1 consecutive year or more" is subject to a ten-year bar to readmission to the United States.
  
  Since 2007, visa overstays have accounted for a larger share of the growth in the illegal immigrant population than illegal border crossings. In 2019, a Center for Migration Studies of New York study found that for the seventh consecutive year, the number of visa overstays significantly surpassed the number of unauthorized border crossings; "from 2016-2017, people who overstayed their visas accounted for 62 percent of the newly undocumented, while 38 percent had crossed a border illegally." Some visa overstays occur unwittingly or inadvertently. In other cases, visa-holders enter the United States without the intention to do so, but ultimately decide to do so due to extenuating circumstances, such as dangers in their home countries.