Will the Immigration Reform Bill Eliminate Green Card Lottery?

Will the Immigration Reform Bill Eliminate Green Card Lottery?The Diversity Visa lottery program that has been helping several foreign nationals to immigrate to America, is likely to be abolished. This might happen if the Senate immigration reform bill is passed and signed into law. The aim of the Green Card lottery program is to give a chance to the citizens of under-represented countries to immigrate to the United States. This program conducted by the US Congress, allocates 50,000 diversity immigrant visas every year and grants the eligible winners of the program, permanent resident visas. Several Kenyans have participated in this program and have immigrated to America and Africa is the country that has been a major beneficiary.

Earlier, the Republicans wanted to abolish the Green Card lottery program and issue all the 50,000 visas to the STEM graduates. They came out with that idea as the high skilled foreign students who are unable to get permanent resident visas, return to their home countries after earning their degrees from American universities. They had a notion that the county would be able to retain such talented individuals if immigrant visas are issued to the students, instead of granting immigrant visas to the winners of the Green Card lottery program. Moreover, if visas are issued to the individuals who hold advanced degrees, they would settle in the country and work in the country. They would also start companies and create jobs in America and boost the country’s economy.

The Democrats wanted to retain the high skilled foreign students but they did not want to put an end to the lottery program. The Democratic party always wanted to pass a large immigration bill that would legalize the undocumented immigrants and they wanted reform the immigration laws of the country. However, the immigration reform bill that the senators have unveiled would abolish the Diversity Visa lottery program and grant visas based on merit. According to this new system, immigrants would be awarded points and immigrant visas would be issued to the immigrants who secure more points. Only the winners of DV-2013 and DV-2014 would be granted immigrant visas and the US Congress may not conduct DV-2015, if the immigration bill is passed. However, the merit based visa would be created five years after the enactment of the immigration reform bill.