Featuring Héctor Benítez, president of Benme Legal

The United States will limit how long international students on an F visa can stay, a measure that could especially affect Latin Americans. Starting September 15, the stay will be capped at four years, unlike the current setup, in which students enter without a specific departure date.

Our president, Héctor Benítez, was consulted by Bloomberg Línea to explain the scope of the measure. Until now, it was enough for the institution to be accredited with SEVIS and ICE for a student to keep studying, even if the passport sticker had expired. With this change, to continue studying once the four years are up, you’ll need a validation from USCIS or a petition through a consulate, proving once again that you meet the conditions of an international student.

Benítez notes that those conditions generally include maintaining the financial means to study and keeping ties to your home country—requirements that universities used to validate and that will now fall to USCIS or the embassy. That’s where the main difficulty lies: many people may no longer have the same financial backing or the same ties to their home country that they had when they first applied for the visa.

The impact would be greater for those in programs that run longer than four years. Doctoral students, whose programs often last around six years, will have to request an Extension of Stay (EOS), with the risk of being denied after several years of study. On top of that, there’s an added requirement: those applying for a new visa or an extension through a consulate will need to have their social media set to public, and their posts could factor into the approval. Those who don’t obtain the extension would be exposed to immigration detention and deportati

By the numbers, the weight of the Latin American community is significant: Brazil, Mexico, Colombia, and Peru rank in the top 25 countries with the most students in the U.S., and together with Venezuela they make up around 60% of the region’s students.

The good news is that there are alternatives. Benítez mentions that, depending on each person’s profile, other paths can be explored once the four-year permit ends, such as the National Interest Waiver (EB-2) for those with a bachelor’s and a master’s degree, the investment visa (E-2), or a change of status to an employment visa (H-1B). The key, as always, is to plan ahead and evaluate each case individually.

Courtesy of Bloomberg Línea. Based on the article “Cómo impactarán a los latinoamericanos los cambios en la visa F para estudiantes en EE.UU.,” by Carlos Cuevas, published August 24, 2026. You can read the full article at bloomberg linea.