It’s aggravating. Could you take sick days/emergency personal days though and use those for interviews?
My husband’s work place has really hard policy on taking days off/vacations. You could be denied, only allowed if you find someone to work for you etc When he requests vacation time, he specifies that this is family big event/family wedding etc that involves tickets that were already purchased. They’ve been times that he called sick because they didn’t allow him to take a day off requested 3 months ahead of time. It’s a constant stress.
So I think your option is just call sick every time they deny your vacation time and when requesting vacations specify that it’s a family thing with tickets already purchased. At this point I’d lie. Nephew’s wedding etc you are in a wedding party etc