Biden Judge Orders Restart of Green Card Lottery Amid Security Concerns
A Biden-appointed judge mandates the U.S. State Department to restart the Diversity Visa lottery, citing security review issues.
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A federal judge appointed by President Joe Biden has ordered the U.S. State Department to reinstate the Diversity Immigrant Visa lottery for fiscal year 2027 by Sunday, forcing the Trump administration to resume a program it had suspended following a deadly shooting linked to a beneficiary of the program.
Judge Orders Reinstatement Amid National Security Concerns
U.S. District Judge Jinsook Ohta of the Southern District of California issued a preliminary injunction requiring Secretary of State Marco Rubio to publicly announce and open registration for the Diversity Visa program, which awards permanent residency to up to 55,000 applicants annually from countries with historically low immigration rates. Registration is typically a random lottery with millions of entries, with winners undergoing interviews and vetting.
According to the ruling, the State Department must open a 30-day electronic registration period by October 18 and notify selected applicants by November 19. The government is then required to proceed with visa processing, subject to statutory eligibility requirements and annual limits.
Program Suspended After Deadly Attacks
President Donald Trump ordered the immediate suspension of the Diversity Visa Program after authorities identified the suspect in the Brown University and MIT attacks as a beneficiary of the program. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem announced the pause, stating that the shooter, Claudio Manuel Neves Valente, had entered the United States through the diversity lottery in 2017 and was granted a green card.
Valente, a 48-year-old Portuguese national, had previously studied at Brown University on a student visa before obtaining the diversity visa and permanent residency. He is believed to have opened fire in a Brown University lecture hall in December 2025, killing two students and wounding nine others, then murdered MIT professor Nuno F.G. Loureiro before taking his own life.
Legal Challenge and Judicial Ruling
The Trump administration had not opened the fiscal year 2027 registration window on the normal schedule, effectively pausing the program amid national security reviews of screening and vetting. Immigration lawyers, including California-based Red Eagle Law, sued, arguing this amounted to a de facto cancellation of the program, which was created by Congress in 1990.
Ohta ruled that the failure to open registration was arbitrary and capricious, ordering the State Department to announce the registration period, keep it open for at least 30 days, accept eligible electronic entries, notify selected applicants, and process applications under normal procedures until the available visas are issued or the fiscal year ends in September 2027.
Controversy Over Judicial Overreach
Critics view the ruling as another example of an unelected Biden-appointed judge attempting to override the elected administration’s efforts to tighten immigration security following real-world attacks. The Diversity Visa program has a troubled history with security failures, with Trump previously seeking to end it after the 2017 New York City truck attack by Sayfullo Saipov, who entered via the lottery and killed eight people.
Noem and Trump officials have repeatedly described the program as a “disastrous” pathway that prioritizes diversity over rigorous national-interest screening.
Source: The Gateway Pundit
