In the July 2017 Visa Bulletin, the Department of State released the diversity visa (DV) fiscal year 2018 results. The Kentucky Consular Center has registered and notified the winners of the DV-2018 diversity lottery. Those selected will need to act on their immigrant visa applications quickly, the bulletin warns.
The DV lottery makes available 50,000 permanent resident visas annually to persons from countries with low rates of immigration to the United States. Approximately 115,968 applicants have been registered and notified and may now make an application for an immigrant visa. The bulletin says that since it is likely that some of the first 50,000 persons registered will not pursue their cases to visa issuance, the larger figure is intended to ensure that all DV-2018 numbers will be used during FY 2018 (October 1, 2017, through September 30, 2018).
Applicants registered for the DV-2018 program were selected at random from 14,692,258 qualified entries (23,088,613 with derivatives) received during the 34-day application period that ran from Wednesday, October 4, 2016, until Monday, November 7, 2016. The visas have been apportioned among six geographic regions with a maximum of seven percent available to persons born in any single country. During the visa interview, the bulletin notes, principal applicants must provide proof of a high school education or its equivalent, or show two years of work experience in an occupation that requires at least two years of training or experience within the past five years.
Registrants living legally in the United States who wish to apply for adjustment of their status must contact U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services for information on the requirements and procedures. Once the visa numbers have been used, the program for FY 2018 will end. Selected applicants who do not receive visas by September 30, 2018 will derive no further benefit from their DV-2018 registration. Similarly, spouses and children accompanying or following to join DV-2018 principal applicants are only entitled to derivative diversity visa status until September 30, 2018.
The bulletin notes that dates for the DV-2019 program registration period will be publicized in the coming months.
The July Visa Bulletin, which includes a statistical country-by-country breakdown of those registered for the DV-2018 program, is at https://travel.state.gov/content/visas/en/law-and-policy/bulletin/2017/visa-bulletin-for-july-2017.html.