Green Card Lottery or STEM? Or Should US Immigration Include Both?

According to the Republicans, STEM graduates must be granted Green Cards while they complete their advanced degrees in the STEM fields in the United States. Similarly, they also want to put an end to the diversity visa lottery program through which Green Cards are granted to foreign nationals who participate and win the lottery program. But this law that was proposed by the Republicans was not passed by the US Congress. That is because the Democrats do not want to abolish the lottery program and they look forward to grant lawful status to the people who complete advanced degrees in the STEM fields and they also want to retain the Green Card lottery program.

But the Republicans say that the United States can give out immigrant visas to the STEM graduates or it can grant immigrant visas through the lottery program, but it cannot do both. Hence they want to grant 50,000 immigrant visas to the people with advanced degrees in the STEM fields and they do not want to grant immigrant visas through the Green Card lottery program. The Democrats argue that the country can grant visas to STEM graduates and it can also issue visas to the winners of the lottery program as this lottery program has been granting opportunities to thousands of foreign nationals to immigrate to the United States.

People with advanced degrees are likely to be sponsored by the US employers, but that process is quite lengthy. Republican and Democratic politicians say that they want to make that process easier so that the STEM graduates may not be required to wait for a long time to become permanent residents of the country. The country requires more talented entrepreneurs in order to add to the competitiveness of the United States. However, the lottery program has also brought many talented entrepreneurs to the country and many such successful entrepreneurs say that they had got opportunities to enter into the country only because of the lottery program. This Green Card lottery program is the only chance for many people to immigrate lawfully to the United States. Hence the Democrats want to keep the lottery program and they also want to grant immigrant visas to the STEM graduates and keep them in the country.