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About 30,000 visa lottery winners will not get benefits

2020-10-01T22:56:41.079Z


Just over 9,000 winners of the visa lottery may benefit, but there will be another 30,000 who will be left out. The judge cited the impact of COVID-19 on the State Department's capacity to process cases.


By Julie Watson - AP



A federal judge on Wednesday ordered the Administration of President Donald Trump to reserve more than 9,000 places for

winners of the visa lottery affected by the freeze that the government ordered this year on green cards.

However, tens of thousands of other visa lottery winners will be out of luck.

Judge Amit Mehta acknowledged that his order will mean that only half of the so-called diversity visas that are normally issued each year will be used.

In her decision, she noted that she was lenient in her ruling with the State Department due to the coronavirus.

Mehta turned down a request from attorneys to order 30,000 spots for lottery winners to be set aside but that had not yet been investigated.

Since 15,400 visas were issued during the fiscal year that ended Wednesday, the additional 30,000 that activists were asking for for lottery winners would have brought the total closer to the annual average of 47,404 for the past 18 years.

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The judge said it was necessary to consider the impact of COVID-19 on the State Department's processing capacity, for which he ordered 9,095 places to be set aside.

"The problem with the number proposed by the plaintiffs is that they ask the court to treat fiscal year 2020 as if it were a 'regular year.'

But, highlighting the obvious, it has had nothing to regulate, "Mehta declared in his decision."

The pandemic has caused operational disruptions worldwide in the consular activities and visa processing of

the State Department. "

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The United States makes up to 55,000 visas a year available to immigrants whose nationalities are underrepresented in the country's population.

The winners are chosen at random from among some 14 million applicants to be awarded

green cards or green cards

 that would allow them to live permanently in the United States.

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However, winners must be screened and have visas in hand by September 30 of the year they were chosen or they lose their chance.

This year, the State Department had issued more than 12,000 visas for the 2020 lottery

, when President Donald Trump in April extended a freeze on the delivery of many permanent residence cards outside the United States until the end of the year, including visas. of the lottery.

Source: telemundo

All news articles on 2020-10-01

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