
It’s not a fee. It’s a deposit of either $5,000, $10,000, or $15,000 which is decided by a U.S. Consular Officer. You get your money back for leaving the U.S. on or before the end of your visa. It was put in place for 50 countries with the highest rates of overstaying their visa to ensure that they leave before or when it is up.
most of the WC headlines have just been highlighting how xenophobic the US is becoming, sure there’s been “number go up” success financially, but the impact on our standing in the world has become “we only want the *right* kind of people coming in” and we get to do this dance all over again for the olympics in 2 years