There are three unlawful presence bars, and people mix them up constantly. The difference decides whether a case takes months, years, or a decade.
The three and ten year bars
Under INA 212(a)(9)(B), someone who accrues more than 180 days of unlawful presence and then leaves the country is inadmissible for three years. More than a year of unlawful presence, and it is ten. The bar is triggered by the departure, not by the unlawful presence alone, which is why leaving can be the worst possible move.
A waiver exists for these, and for many people it can be applied for before they leave, on Form I-601A.
The permanent bar
INA 212(a)(9)(C) is different. It reaches someone who accrued more than a year of unlawful presence in total, or who was ordered removed, and who then entered or tried to enter the United States again without being inspected.
Two things make it severe. There is no ordinary waiver available from inside the country. And the person generally has to remain outside the United States for ten years before they can even ask permission to reapply for admission, on Form I-212. It is called permanent because the clock does not start while you are here.
The word 'total' matters in the first part. Unlawful presence can be added together across separate periods, so people who think of themselves as having a few short gaps sometimes have more than a year in aggregate.
Why people trigger it without meaning to
Almost nobody triggers this deliberately. It usually happens when someone leaves under pressure, or is removed, and comes back the only way available to them because a family member is here. The second entry is the step that does the damage.
This is also why we take entry and exit history first, before anything else. A client who says 'I have been here since 2015' and a client who says 'I have been here since 2015, except for four months in 2018' may be in completely different legal positions.
One recent change worth knowing about
On 13 August 2026 the Board of Immigration Appeals decided Matter of Delcarmen-Lara, holding that leaving the United States on advance parole is a departure for purposes of the unlawful presence bars. That overruled a 2012 decision, Matter of Arrabally and Yerrabelly, that many people relied on for fourteen years. The Board applied the new rule going forward.
If you have a pending green card application, unlawful presence in your past, and a trip planned on advance parole, speak to a lawyer before you book anything. This is the exact situation the new decision changes.
Because the consequences here are permanent, we review the full entry and exit history of every client before filing anything that could trigger a finding under these sections.