The organization discussed possible systems for bringing scholars into the country as quickly as possible, such as one used by the National Science Foundation to expedite international travel.

But the outlook for fixing the problem in the short term is not good, Casey says.

“I think that things might actually get worse. There’s no new silver bullet on this issue,” Casey says. “We’re as frustrated as everyone else.”

El-Gaili’s frustrations peaked in September, as he frantically made arrangements to take classes at a London law school so that he could graduate from HLS on time.

When he finally received his visa stamp in mid-November, four months had passed from the time he submitted his application.

Before this year, getting a visa typically took him less than a week, el-Gaili says.

Now, having arrived at last in Cambridge to finish a Harvard career that began in 1994, el-Gaili recounts the extraordinary ordeal that began for him in the late summer.

Business as Usual

El-Gaili first came to the United States in 1993 as a high-school senior at St. Philip’s Academy, Andover, and enrolled at Harvard the following year. He worked for two years as an analyst at Morgan Stanley following his graduation before entering HLS in 2000.

Even before the events of Sept. 11, visa applications were a constant presence in el-Gaili’s life: because Sudan is on the Department of State’s list of nations potentially sponsoring international terrorism, he was only eligible for six-month U.S. visas.

But last summer, the state department informed visa applicants that they might have to wait longer, perhaps three to four weeks, before receiving their visas.

When he submitted his visa application on July 23—three days after transferring from New York to the London office of his summer employer, the law firm Sullivan and Cromwell—el-Gaili assumed that he would receive his visa long before his planned return to Cambridge on Aug. 31.

But under the stipulations of the Enhanced Border Security and Visa Reform Act of 2002, state department regulations had changed since the last time el-Gaili had applied. Citizens over the age of 16 in Sudan and the six other nations designated as state sponsors of terrorism now had to complete additional forms and appear for an interview.

On Aug. 16, only 15 days before he planned to return to the U.S., el-Gaili received his passport back from the government—but instead of including a visa stamp that would let him enter the country, the consulate requested an interview first.

When el-Gaili signed up for the next available interview on Aug. 29, he assumed that he would be able to return to the U.S. two days later according to his original plans.