Trump suspends green card lottery program after Brown University shootings
US pauses green card lottery after fatal shootings
- President Trump has suspended the green card lottery program following a series of shootings allegedly committed by a recipient of the scheme.
- Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem announced the suspension, stating the suspect, Claudio Neves Valente, should never have been allowed into the country.
- Neves Valente, a 48-year-old Portuguese national, is suspected of killing two students and wounding nine others at Brown University, and killing an MIT professor, before dying from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
- He obtained legal permanent residence in 2017 through the diversity visa program, which makes up to 50,000 green cards available annually by lottery to people from underrepresented countries.
- Trump has long opposed the diversity visa lottery, and this action is consistent with his history of using tragic events to advance his immigration policy goals.