The
Diversity Immigrant Visa program is a
United States congressionally-mandated
lottery program for receiving a
United States Permanent Resident Card. It is also known as the
Green Card Lottery. The lottery is administered on an annual basis by the
Department of State and conducted under the terms of Section 203(c) of the
Immigration and Nationality Act (INA). Section 131 of the
Immigration Act of 1990 (Pub. L. 101-649) amended INA 203 to provide for a new class of
immigrants known as "diversity immigrants" (DV immigrants). The Act makes available 50,000 permanent resident visas annually to persons from countries with low rates of immigration to the United States.
Ineligible countries
Those born in any territory that has sent more than 50,000 immigrants to the United States in the previous five years are not eligible to receive a diversity visa. For DV-2012, natives of the following nations are ineligible:
Brazil,
Canada,
China (mainland-born),
Colombia,
Dominican Republic,
Ecuador,
El Salvador,
Guatemala,
Haiti,
India,
Jamaica,
Mexico,
Pakistan,
Peru,
Philippines,
Poland,
South Korea,
United Kingdom (except
Northern Ireland) and its dependent territories, and
Vietnam. The entry period to apply for the DV-2012 was from October 5, 2010 to November 3, 2010.
Exemptions
The term 50,000 "immigrants" is partial and refers only to people who immigrated via the family-sponsored, employment, or immediate relatives of U.S. citizen categories, and does not include other categories such as refugees, asylum seekers,
NASCAR beneficiaries, or previous diversity immigrants. It is for this reason that
Cuba,
Ukraine,
Iran,
Ethiopia,
Bangladesh,
Nigeria,
Russia and
Venezuela are not on the ineligible list despite sending over 50,000 immigrants in the previous five years.
Changes
The first program was DV-1995, and the following 13 countries were ineligible from the start: Canada, China (mainland), Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Haiti, India, Jamaica, Mexico, Philippines, South Korea, Taiwan, United Kingdom (except Northern Ireland) and its dependent territories, and Vietnam.
Changes to the list of countries over the years include the following:
DV-1996: Colombia now ineligible.
DV-1998: Poland now ineligible.
DV-2002: Poland and Taiwan now eligible, Pakistan ineligible.
DV-2004: East Timor added, eligible.
DV-2005: Russia now ineligible.
DV-2007: Poland again ineligible.
DV-2008: Brazil and Peru now ineligible; Serbia and Montenegro listed separately, both eligible.
DV-2009: Ecuador and Guatemala now ineligible.
DV-2010: Russia now eligible; Kosovo added, eligible.
The large number of changes for DV-2002 was due to a three-year gap between the publication of the 1998 and 1999 immigration statistics. In other words, DV-2001 was still using the statistics from the five-year period from 1994 to 1998 to determine country eligibility. As immigration has increased, the number of ineligible countries has risen, from 13 for DV-1995 to 19 now. Taiwan is the only country which was ineligible in 1995 but eligible now due to decreasing immigration.
Russia fell below the ineligibility limit for DV-2010 due to a combination of a sharp dropoff in adoptions (from 5,878 in 2004 to 2,301 in 2007) and the unusual bureaucratic quirk of large numbers of Russian immigrants being allocated to "Soviet Union (former)" rather than Russia in 2006 and 2007.
Distribution and lottery process
The visas are distributed on a regional basis, with each region sending fewer immigrants to the US in the previous 5 years receiving more diversity visas. Currently, Africa and Europe receive about 80% of the visas in the lottery. In addition, no single country can receive more than 7% of the total number of visas (3,500).
In order to allow for those who do not pursue immigrant visas, and for the applicants who do not qualify, more 'winners' are selected in the lottery than there are visas available. Hence being selected from the lottery does not guarantee an immigrant visa to the U.S. To receive a diversity visa and immigrate to the United States, 'winners' must meet all eligibility requirements under U.S. law to qualify, and must be interviewed before the 50,000 green cards are distributed. Requirements include at least a high school diploma, or its equivalent, or two years of work experience in an occupation requiring at least two years training.
Over 13.6 million applications for the 2008 Diversity Visa Lottery (DV-2010) were submitted — an increase of 4.5 million, or 50%, from the 9.1 million applications submitted in the 2007 Diversity Visa Lottery (DV-2009).
Starting with the DV-2008, several questions and options for answers have been added. Applicants are now required to provide information, such as the country where they currently live and their highest level of education achieved, in the Electronic Diversity Visa Entry Form (E-DV Entry Form).
The open registration period for the lottery was restored from 60 days to 30 days beginning with the calendar year 2010 diversity visa lottery (DV-2012).
Winning chances
Winning chances per year, per continent, per legitimate entry, DV-2007 through DV-2011
{| class="wikitable sortable"
|-
! Region !! DV-2007 !! DV-2008 !! DV-2009 !! DV-2010 !! DV-2011
|-
|Africa||1.31%||2.40%||2.30%||2.19%||2.06%
|-
|Asia||0.48%||0.63%||0.64%||0.61%||0.68%
|-
|Europe||1.26%||1.85%||1.94%||2.10%||1.75%
|-
|North America||0.61%||0.64%||0.38%||0.69%||0.47%
|-
|Oceania||4.13%||4.57%||4.62%||5.49%||4.63%
|-
|South and Central America and the Caribbean||0.65%||0.84%||1.05%||1.69%||1.07%
|}
Jump in those probabilities from DV-2007 to DV-2008 was caused by significant improvement in fraud prevention techniques and error prevention techniques (mainly catching duplicate entries and throwing out entries with invalid photos).
Legitimate entry for the purpose of this table is an entry with photos of humans satisfying all photo requirements, that do not have duplicates where photos coincide as files. Legitimate entries are not disqualified during the selection process.
Chances to get visa for a winner
Those are the average numbers per continent, in reality they differ from country to country and do not depend on the continent at all.
For a country with statistically significant amount of winners (more than 100) the highest chance to get a visa per winner in DV-2009 was Nepal, Asia (85.4%) and the lowest was Senegal, Africa (14.05%)
Those numbers include lack of desire to get a visa by a winner who is a visa applicant or inability to satisfy visa requirements.
Chances to get visa for winners, per year, per continent, DV-2007 through DV-2009
{| class="wikitable sortable"
|-
! Region !! DV-2007 !! DV-2008 !! DV-2009
|-
|Africa||41.01%||43.47%||46.12%
|-
|Asia||59.59%||51.87%||55.37%
|-
|Europe||56.26%||56.50%||50.83%
|-
|North America||50.00%||29.41%||8.33%
|-
|Oceania||38.75%||41.42%||33.59%
|-
|South and Central America and the Caribbean||54.86%||45.26%||41.44%
|}
2010 Results
For the 2010 Diversity Visa Lottery, the winning applicants were apportioned as follows: :
{| class="wikitable sortable"
|-
! Region
! Winner Allocation
! Country with Highest Number of Winners
|-
| Africa
| 52.63 %
|
Ghana
|-
| Europe
| 29.04 %
|
Ukraine
|-
| Asia
| 14.62 %
|
Bangladesh
|-
| South and Central America and the Caribbean
| 1.93 %
|
Venezuela
|
|-
| Oceania
| 1.76 %
|
Australia
|
|-
| North America
| 0.02%
|
Bahamas
|
|}
Legal status
In December 2005, the
United States House of Representatives voted 273-148 to add an amendment to the border enforcement bill
H.R. 4437 abolishing the DV. Opponents of the lottery said it was susceptible to fraud and was a way for terrorists to enter the country. The Senate never passed the bill.
In March 2007, Congressman Bob Goodlatte (R-VA) introduced , which would eliminate the diversity visa program.
In June 2007, the U.S. House passed H.R. 2764 to eliminate funding for the program, and the Senate did likewise in September. However, the final version of this bill with amendments, signed into law on December 26, 2007, did not include the removal of funds for the program.
Several attempts have been made over the last several years to eliminate the lottery. Although H.R. 2764 was an appropriation bill and could only cut funds for the lottery during one fiscal year, this was the first time that both the House and the Senate passed a bill to halt the diversity visa program.
Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-VA) reintroduced his Security and Fairness Enhancement for America Act (formerly H.R. 1430, now ) on May 7, 2009. The bill amends the Immigration and Nationality Act to eliminate the diversity immigrant program completely.
Rep.
Sheila Jackson-Lee (D-TX) introduced the Save America Comprehensive Immigration Act of 2009 () on January 7, 2009. The bill would increase the number of diversity visas from 55,000 to 110,000 per year.
Frauds and scams
There is no charge to enter the diversity visa lottery, and the only way to do so is by completing and sending the electronic form available at the U.S. Department of State's website during the registration period. However, there are numerous companies and websites that charge a fee in order to complete the form for the applicant. The Department of State and the
Federal Trade Commission have warned that some of these businesses falsely claim to increase someone's chances of winning the lottery, or that they are affiliated with the U.S. government.
There have also been numerous cases of fraudulent emails and letters which falsely claim to have been sent by the Department of State and that the recipient has been granted a Permanent Resident Card. These messages prompt the recipients to transfer a "visa processing fee" as a prerequisite for obtaining a "guaranteed" green card. The messages are sometimes sent to people who never participated in the lottery and can look trustworthy as they contain the recipient's exact name and contact details and what appears to be a legal notice.
The Department of State has issued a warning against the scammers. It notes that any email claiming the recipient to be a winner of the lottery is fake because the Department has never notified and will not notify winners by email. The Department has urged recipients of such messages to notify the Internet Crime Complaint Center about the scam.
Criticism of the DV Lottery system
Until DV-2010, there was no means by which an applicant could check the status of an application. Only those selected in the lottery were notified, by mail. However, starting with DV-2010 the applicant receives a confirmation number after a successful application is submitted. This number can be used to check the application status online from May 1. This was a long awaited feature since many postal services in developing or politically unstable countries are neither effective nor trustworthy.
Also, there have been arguments by long time temporary legal residents in the United States against the fairness of the DV program. A situation where high skilled (H-1B and L-1 visas) workers remain on temporary visas in the US for years (in some cases, more than a decade) with no clear path to becoming permanent residents while 50,000 random people are picked around the world and handed permanent resident status questions the fairness of the US immigration system.
The odds of winning a diversity immigration visa is based on national origin of current U.S. residents descended from such countries. Hence, for example, Asia has a very small quota. Countries with a large population are often excluded.
DV2012 Fiasco
Due to an alleged programming error, the results of the 2012 DV lottery, which had been available since May 1, 2011, were rescinded on Friday, May 13, 2011. Around 22,000 applicants had been officially notified that they had been selected for further processing. David Donahue, assistant secretary for Visa Services asserted that due to an error in the selection program, the selection had not been random, with more than 90 percent of winners selected coming from among those who had submitted their applications during the first two days of the registration period. As a result, the decision was taken to void all selection results and re-run the selection process. Entrants have been told they will be able to check the new results on or about July 15, 2011.
Kenneth White, an immigration attorney in Los Angeles, contacted the State Department in mid-May requesting that the 22,000 winners be allowed to go forward with their applications and that a second drawing be held for the remaining slots, arguing it would still be a random drawing.
Those who'd already won the lottery say it is unfair to nullify the results. "Thousands of people were devastated by the news of the invalidation," Kenneth White told the Wall Street Journal. Petitions have been created, a blog "OneNation2012" and a Facebook page "22000 Hopes"
to campaign for preserving the 22,000 selectees. Office of Inspector General, U.S. has launched an investigation to review DV-2012 on June 6, 2011.
Would-be immigrants are suing the State Department in a class-action suit despite the agency's Monday announcement that it is conducting an internal review of what went wrong. "Although the results were not as expected and seemed odd on first glance … they were still chosen by an entirely random process," he wrote. "Such results could have happened naturally, and even if there was a computer glitch, as the Department contends … there was a level playing field."
Multiple influential American newspapers, including the full board of editors of Washington Post in an unprecedented action, have taken the position supporting reinstating the visa winners.
References
External links
U.S. Department of State - DV-2011 program
Electronic Diversity Visa Lottery
Electronic Diversity Visa Lottery - Instructions for Photographs
U.S. State Department - Warning on fraudulent diversity visa websites
Representative Herseth - Amendment to eliminate visa lottery
H.R.2764, The library of Congress, Thomas
U.S. Embassy visa webchat regarding DV lottery Program, February 3, 2009
22 CFR 42.33 - Diversity Immigrants, 04/01/2009 Edition
9 FAM 42.33 Notes - Diversity Immigrants
9 FAM 42.33 Procedural Notes - Diversity Immigrants
9 FAM 42.12 Notes - Rules of Chargeability
9 FAM 42.12 Exhibit I - Country-by-country specifics of chargeability rules
Total Number of DV Lottery Applicants by Country, Programs DV-2007 through DV-2012
Immigrant Number Use for Visa Issuances and Adjustments of Status in the Diversity Immigrant Category, Programs DV-2000 through DV-2009
THE DIVERSITY LOTTERY – A DECEPTIVELY SIMPLE PROGRAM (An Update) By Bernard P. Wolfsdorf and Naveen Rahman
GAO Report to the Chairman, Committee on Homeland Security, House of Representatives Border Security Fraud Risks Complicate State’s Ability to Manage Diversity Visa Program
Acceptance of DV-related I-485 Applications During 90-day Period Preceding Cut-Off Number in the Visa Bulletin Immigration and Naturalization Service Memorandum
Questions and Answers. USCIS National Stakeholder Meeting Question 11. Current state of the 90-day memorandum
USCIS – AILA Liaison Committee Agenda Issue 5. Current state of the 90-day memorandum]
DV Lottery Scam Email
Category:Immigration to the United States
Category:United States visa policy
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