September 18, 2017
Diversity Visa Lottery Registration Will Open On October 3, 2017
Each year the U.S. Department of State conducts a “lottery” of qualified applicants from under-represented countries, selecting 50,000 individuals who may then immigrate to the U.S. and receive their “green cards.” The applicants must register online and meet the following basic requirements:
- Must have been born in an eligible country (see page 16 of the registration instructions).
- Or, be married to a person born in one of those countries
- Or, in special cases, be the child of parents born in an eligible country
- And, must meet the either educational or work experience requirement:
- Have at least a high school education, OR
- Have two years of work experience within the past five years in an occupation that requires at least two years of training or experience to perform.
Qualified entrants may submit just one application. Entries for the Fiscal Year 2019 lottery should be submitted electronically at https://www.dvlottery.state.gov/ between noon, Eastern Daylight Time (EDT) (GMT-4), Tuesday, October 3, 2017, and noon, Eastern Standard Time (EST) (GMT-5), Tuesday, November 7, 2017. The website may experience problems during high-traffic times (such as the last days of the filing window), so we recommend completing the application as soon as possible. It is important to fill out the requested information completely and truthfully and to carefully follow the guidelines for submitting photos. There is no cost to submit an entry form and we caution our clients to only use the state.gov website, and be wary of any “copycat” websites that charge a fee to submit the application.
Once an entry is submitted, the applicant will receive a confirmation page and confirmation number. The confirmation page should be printed, and the number should be carefully recorded. Again, we recommend caution against scams that offer to provide a confirmation number for a fee. The U.S. Department of State will randomly select individuals entries by computer, from among the qualified entrants. Individuals may then go to the Entrant Status Check section of https://www.dvlottery.state.gov/ to find out if they have been selected, using their confirmation number, starting on May 1, 2018, through September 30, 2019. If selected, individuals and their qualifying dependent family members will receive instructions through the website on how to apply for their green cards through either adjustment of status, or through consular processing.
We encourage all qualified individuals to enter the Fiscal Year 2019 Diversity Visa Lottery and we wish them luck!