Not in my experience they're not, and I know for sure that D-Mo on dttusa will know the complete up to date situation without doubt.
The U.S. Consulate in the DR is giving visitor B1/B2 visas like hot cakes for the past months.
Minimal requirements still must be met.
The reason for this is dual.
The DR will later become allowed to be included on the visa waiver list of countries to the U.S.
The other is due to the U.S. Authorities (DHS) wanting and actually using the DR as a process center for residency applicants now in the homeland, but that will be required to exit the country and deposit their application in a secondary consulate. The DR is now being used to process a workload of these applicants since 90 days ago.
The DHS is also installing customs pre-clearance areas in all Main international DR airports.
The DHS has been granted clearance to the newly installed national bio-metrics database in the DR.
The DR is also providing pre-boarding data from all incoming flights to the DR to the DHS as well.
The no-flight active list has been also shared with the DR in order to track all incoming passengers into the country.
If anybody needs a visa to the U.S. Now it's the time to do it.
All they need is to meet the minimum requirements.
Dominicans renewing their expiring visas will get 10 year renewals for the most part.
Replacing the visa to travel to the U.S. Will be a pre- clearance online document that must be filed with the DHS prior to traveling there for Dominicans.
They are trying to process as many people as possible fast in the DR, so later they can have less workloads on issuing pre clearance travel permits.
You must meet the minimum requirements and that's it.
The change is due to Canada now requiring applicants wanting to follow up on their residency permits in the U.S. To file for a new visa to their country unlike before. Canada will no longer accept temporary permit holders in the U.S. Visa waiver entry to their country to deposit their documents at the U.S. Consulate there.
The DR will now become the new processing center for these individuals if they opt not to return to their country of origin to do so. This also includes refugee applicants.
This is all in agreement with the DR authorities...