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I was once surprised to see a US admission stamp in a friend's US passport. However, I saw in another question that some Americans have their passports stamped often when entering the US, so this was not an isolated incident.

  • Is there an official source that indicates a purpose for these stamps?
  • Is there any rule for why these stamps are given out sometimes but not always?
  • Would these stamps always be given on request (e.g., for Americans who want to prove that they did not overstay in a foreign country)?
Augustine of Hippo
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Brian
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2 Answers2

5

I had the same experience in on July 13 last year and submitted a question to CBP.

Response from CBP

Dear Paul,

Thank you for contacting the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Information Center.

CBP officers usually do not stamp US passports because many people travel frequently and the passports would quickly fill up. The CBP officers may stamp the passport at their discretion or if a person requests it.

Please reply to this email if you have other questions.

Thank you again for contacting our office.

Mark

My suspicion is such incidents happen when CBP officers who hitherto were processing noncitizens (whose passports must be stamped) are moved to process citizens and mistakenly do the stamping from muscle memory.

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Augustine of Hippo
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Would these stamps always be given on request (e.g., for Americans who want to prove that they did not overstay in a foreign country)?

No, according to https://stuff.mit.edu/people/stransky/us_entry_passport_stamps.html (mirror):

Ports of entry I've used with no stamp received, even after asking:

  • Laurier, Washington
  • San Ysidro, California
  • El Paso, Texas
  • Detroit Tunnel, Michigan
  • Falcon Dam, Texas
  • Heart Island, New York
  • West Berkshire, Vermont
Franck Dernoncourt
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