Court orders State Department to reserve diversity visas

In litigation challenging the immigrant travel ban, a court has ordered the State Department to reserve 9,095 immigrant visas to be issued to DV-2020 lottery winners.

Key Points:

• The court previously found that President Trump’s immigrant travel ban (proclamation 9994) bars entry, not visa issuance, and ordered the State Department to begin issuing immigrant visas to DV-2020 lottery winners. At that time, about 43,000 of the 55,000 annual allotment of diversity visas were unissued.
• The new ruling requires the agency to reserve the additional immigrant visas to be issued beyond the normal deadline of Sept. 30, 2020.

BAL Analysis: The immigrant travel ban remains in effect, and even if the State Department issues the visas in compliance with the court order, the visa holders are barred from entering the U.S. until the travel ban is lifted. The ban is scheduled to expire Dec. 31, but it may be extended by presidential order.

This alert has been provided by the BAL U.S. Practice group. For additional information, please contact berryapplemanleiden@bal.com.

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