Integrity Legal

Each year, the United States of America opens the “visa lottery.” Basically, foreign nationals from countries with small numbers of immigrants in the United States are entitled to submit an application for a Diversity visa. As the name implies, the Diversity visa was designed to facilitate cultural diversity in the United States by providing immigrant visas to those originating from various foreign countries.

According to the United States Department of State diversity visa application registration began on October 2, 2009:

The Department of State announces the opening of the registration period for the DV-2011 Diversity Visa lottery. Entries for the DV-2011 Diversity Visa lottery must be submitted electronically between noon, Eastern Daylight Time (EDT) (GMT-4), Friday, October 2, 2009, and noon, Eastern Standard Time (EST) (GMT-5), Monday, November 30, 2009. Applicants may access the electronic Diversity Visa entry form (E-DV) at www.dvlottery.state.gov during the registration period. Paper entries will not be accepted. Applicants are strongly encouraged not to wait until the last week of the registration period to enter. Heavy demand may result in website delays. No entries will be accepted after noon EST on November 30, 2009.

It should be noted that the Diversity visa application is absolutely free. Under provisions of the United States Immigration and Nationality Act, there is a special visa category for so-called diversity immigrants.

We at Integrity Legal generally do not handle Diversity visa cases as the process is fairly straightforward and can often be handled by an applicant without retaining counsel. Unfortunately, there are those who attempt to defraud unwitting consumers. A common claim made by some is that a diversity visa can be obtained after paying an initial application fee which is absolutely not true. The application for a Diversity visa is provided free of charge.

Only 55,000 visas are available each year and as a result, the chance of acquiring this type of visa is rather low. That being said, the visa lottery winners are drawn from a list of those who are from countries with low numbers of immigrants in the USA. There is a list of countries whose nationals are ineligible for a diversity visa. The list of ineligible nationals has not changed since the last round of the diversity visa lottery. Those granted a diversity visa will be entitled to residence upon entry in the United States.

For more information regarding the Diversity Visa please see our previous posting on this blog.

Visit this website: www.dvlottery.state.gov for more details.

Tags: Diversity Visa, Green Card Lottery, US Visa Thailand, Visa Lottery