That fiscal year, the United States will issue 55,000 legal permanent residence visas, or Green Cards. What are the requirements and until when is there a deadline to register?

The Government of the United States announced that on October 6 it will begin to receive applications for the “visa lottery” corresponding to fiscal year 2023, a period for which nationals of Venezuela as well as Brazil, Colombia, El Salvador, Haiti, have been excluded. Honduras, Jamaica and the Dominican Republic, among others.

The registration period for this annual draw expires on November 9, and that fiscal year will deliver 55,000 legal permanent residence visas, or “green card.”

Between 11 million and 14 million citizens of the countries Washington lists participate in it , who can apply for free on the US Department of State website.

The sweepstakes rules exclude countries that have sent more than 50,000 migrants to the United States in the past five years , and rather open participation to citizens of countries with historically low rates of migration to the United States.

This year the draw has a particular meaning given that US President Joe Biden lifted the restrictions on the program and in general the immigration bans ordered by his predecessor, Donald Trump.

The requirements

The Infobae portal prepared a guide on the requirements to apply for the visa lottery:

Applicants must ensure that their country of origin is eligible . The countries whose citizens will not be able to participate this year are:Bangladesh, Brazil, Canada, China (including Hong Kong), Colombia, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Haiti, Honduras, India, Jamaica, Mexico, Nigeria, Pakistan, Philippines, South Korea, United Kingdom (except Northern Ireland) and its dependent territories, Venezuela and Vietnam.

The second requirement is related to formal education. US immigration laws and regulations require that each program participant have at least a high school education or its full equivalent or have two years of work experience out of the last five in an occupation that requires at least two years of training or experience. If the applicant does not meet the education or work experience requirements, they will not be eligible for the program.

Finally, applicants who meet the two previous requirements must fill out a form on the visa program website: https://dvprogram.state.gov/ .

In the questionnaire, applicants must submit personal information such as their names, country of origin, passport number, email, highest academic level achieved, postal address, among others. Applicants must upload recent individual photographs, on a white background where the faces of the applicant, spouse and children are displayed.

The only way applicants will have to know the status of their application is through the Entrant Status Check website . There they will be able to find out if their entry has been selected using the confirmation number received when they submitted their forms.

Results will be available from May 8, 2022 to at least September 30, 2023 .

Visa lottery since the 90s

In 2017, Donald Trump instituted a series of measures to prevent the entry into the country of citizens of countries with a Muslim majority, and the one that ultimately came into force imposed limits on migration from eight countries: Chad, Iran, Libya, Korea. of the North, Syria, Venezuela, Somalia and Yemen.

Shortly after his presidential inauguration on January 20, Biden issued a decree “ending discriminatory vetoes for entry into the United States.”

According to the State Department, in application of the rules imposed by Trump, tens of thousands of visa applications were rejected in fiscal periods 2017, 2018 and 2019.

The visa lottery was established by a 1990 law and is aimed at applicants who meet certain requirements such as having a high school education, at least two years of work experience, and a clean record of criminal activities.

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