With the switching of administrations, immigration has yet again become a hot topic. But, one of the lesser-known ways to immigrate to the U.S. is through the so called, “Visa Lottery” run by the U.S. Department of State, who just released the most recent, “winners.”
The DOS Visa Lottery
The DOS Visa Lottery is officially called the Diversity Immigrant Visa Program (DV-2022) and millions of people from around the world enter every year. Run by the U.S. DOS, the program allows anyone to apply for entry into the U.S. as a permanent resident status. Each year, a set number of people are randomly selected by a DOS computer for the program. For context, for the 2021 Visa Lottery, there were nearly seven million qualified entries that represented about 12 million applicants and family members.
The 2022 Visa Lottery
The 2022 Diversity Immigrant Visa Program winners were announced Sunday, and now about 55,000 people can apply for permanent resident status in the U.S. This is a historically low number of winners for the program.
Who won the lottery?
Visa Lottery entrants must check the DOS’s Bureau of Consular Affairs website. Entrants simply need to check their names and status in the Entrant Status Check search tool. Surprisingly, the winners are not directly notified, and this is the only way to check one’s status. Instead, the only way for winners to know they are winners is to check that DOS website. And, this is why the DOS recommends checking statuses during the evening and other off-peak hours because the website can slow and crash.
What to do next
First, winners can only apply for their diversity visa between Oct. 1, 2021, and Sep. 30, 2022, the federal government fiscal year for 2022. This is a quickly approaching deadline, so winners are encouraged to contact a Charlotte, North Carolina, immigration attorney immediately.