President Donald Trump has expressed his distaste for the diversity visa on numerous occasions. In the Rose Garden on February 15, 2019, Trump exclaimed, "And then you have the lottery. It's a horror show, because when countries put people into the lottery, they're not putting you in; they're putting in some very bad people in the lottery. It's common sense. If I ran a country, and if I have a lottery system of people going to the United States, I'm not going to put in my stars; I'm going to put in people I don't want."
Trump continued with his criticism in a campaign rally in Cincinnati on August 1, 2019, stating, "And you pick people out of a lottery. Well let's see, this one is a murderer, this one robbed four banks, this one I better not say, this one another murderer, ladies and gentlemen, another murderer. Do you think [these countries] are going to put their great citizens . . . into the lottery? Look at the people they put into these lotteries."
Trump's message has been consistent. In 2017, Trump told graduates f the FBI National Academy, "They have a lottery. You pick people. Do you think the country is giving us their best people? No. What kind of a system is that? They come in by lottery. They give us their worst people, they put them in a bin, but in his hand, when he’s picking them is, really, the worst of the worst. Congratulations, you’re going to the United States. Okay. What a system — lottery system."
It is actually quite amazing. Everything Trump says about the diversity visa lottery is completely wrong. Not one bit of it is true. The governments of foreign countries play no role in who applies for a diversity visa through the lottery system. There is no bin. No names are drawn from a hat. Those who win the lottery, and thus have a chance to immigrate to the United States, are vetted to ensure they have no criminal record. Indeed, in order to obtain the visa, a lottery winner must have a certain level of education or skill to ensure they will not be a drain on the U.S. welfare system.
Through the diversity lottery, visas are made available for 50,000 people each year. The idea is to give people from countries that have traditionally sent fewer immigrants to the United States the chance to immigrate to the United States.
If a country has sent 50,000 or more immigrants to the United States in the last five years, then people from that country may not receive a diversity visa. Based on this criteria, people from Canada, Mexico, the Philippines, the Peoples Republic of China, El Salvador, Haiti and South Korea, to name a few, are not eligible.
The diversity visas are distributed by region, with people from the regions sending the fewest immigrants to the United States in the previous five years receiving the most visas. The regions which currently receive the most visas under the program are Africa and Europe. No one country can receive more than seven percent, or 3,500, of the visas available for that year. The visas are distributed at random.
To apply, a person enters the lottery online during the registration period. Winning the lottery does not guarantee that the applicant will receive the visa. Rather, the applicant must meet certain additional requirements. The applicant must have graduated high school, or have spent two out of the last five years in an occupation requiring at least two years' training or experience.
A person does not need to meet the eligibility requirements in order to apply online. This has led to a number of disappointed lottery winners. That is, a person can win the lottery only to learn that he or she does not have the required education or work experience to receive the visa.
The be able to immigrate to the United States, a person who receives a diversity visa must still be admissible pursuant to U.S. immigration law. That means the person may not have committed certain crimes, such as murder, theft or sexual assault. The person cannot have certain communicable diseases, be a habitual drunkard, be likely to become a public charge, or be considered a threat to national security.
To summarize, a person desiring to immigrate to the United States enters the diversity visa lottery. That person's government has nothing to do with the application. Foreign countries do not put people's names into a bit, or a hat, or a box. An individual applies through the internet by going online. A computer program picks names randomly. In order to come to the United States, the person just have a minimum level of education or work experience, and cannot have committed certain crimes.
Thus, when Trump describes the diversity visa, he is engaging in nothing more than fear mongering. This fear mongering fits in with his overall approach to immigration, where he manipulates the fear of his followers to promote more restrictive immigration policies. He ignores studies which show immigrants as less likely than those born in the United States to commit violent crimes, instead painting all immigrants as potential threats to the public safety. Education and access to accurate information can prevent Trump from manipulating the ignorance of his followers to pervert immigration law and policy.
By: William J. Kovatch, Jr.
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