Is it possible for a Schengen country to advise the US to cancel/revoke a valid visa?

Upvote:3

Yes, they can.

Germany cannot cancel an US visa, but it can pass information to the US which leads the US to cancel the visa.

Various countries share intelligence information. One well-known example is the "Five Eyes" group of five English-speaking countries, but similar sharing happens bilaterally and within NATO (which includes Germany and the US).

Intelligence information includes not just terror threats but also information on suspected or confirmed crimes. Legal action is possible if one thinks that the information was wrong, but that will usually get nowhere -- countries don't discuss intelligence matters much.

Upvote:4

There is definitely no data exchange between Schengen countries in general and the US and no legal basis for the US to have (official) access to the main Schengen databases (SIS and VIS). But individual countries can pass on intelligence and it's up to the US what to do with it.

And among European countries, Germany is, beside the UK, one of the countries with the closest relationship with the US as far as intelligence sharing is concerned (historically, the main German intelligence service was set up by the US to reuse older German spy networks, before being handed over to the German government so the links are old and far-reaching). The extent of the collaboration between the BND and its US counterpart (and the extent to which the government was aware of it) even led to a sort of mini-scandal last year.

As far as I know, any information that might have been exchanged between both countries would not usually come in the form of an advice to do anything like cancelling a visa nor would all files be routinely shared with a third country. Rather it would be an informal “we have heard that such and such might have done this”. The decision regarding what to do with it rests entirely with the US.

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