The association said the Biden administration’s "refusal" to address "excessive" wait times for US visa interviews was hampering the rebound.
According to the association, wait times for US visa interviews for potential visitors from some of the country’s top source markets such as Brazil, India and Mexico currently stand at between 400 to 800 days.
In its biannual travel forecast, published on Tuesday (29 November), the association has "significantly downgraded" its expectations for international inbound travel "for the rest of 2022 and 2023".
It said the downgrade was illustrative of a "worrying trend" caused by the economic downturn and exacerbated by "excessive wait times for first-time visa applicants".
"While economic concerns are natural, excessive visitor visa wait times are a man-made obstacle the Biden administration seemingly refuses to address,” said US Travel Association president and chief executive Geoff Freeman. “Reducing visitor visa wait times in top inbound markets will drive visitation and help protect the American economy."
Interview wait times for first-time US visitor visa applicants current exceed an average of 400 days in the top 10 source markets for travel to the US, with wait times in several key international markets "worsening in recent months".
In June, Tourism Economics estimated international visitation to the US would end the year at two-thirds (67%) of pre-pandemic levels, rising to 82% in 2023. This forecast, though, has been downgraded to 63% in 2022 and 75% in 2023.
"This reflects an additional loss of eight million visitors and US $28 billion in spending over those two years," said the US Travel Association. "International inbound travel is not projected to fully recover to pre-pandemic levels until 2025."
The association added: "Excessive wait times severely undercut America’s global competitiveness and the Biden administration’s national goal for inbound visitation.
The US Department of Commerce’s National Travel and Tourism Strategy identifies inbound travel as an economic priority and sets a national goal of welcoming 90 million international visitors by 2027, while State Department processing for this visa class in top markets is not meeting demand."
