The Trump administration suspends the US green card lottery after the suspect in a mass shooting entered through the programme, says security chief
WASHINGTON: The Trump administration has suspended the United States green card lottery, citing its use by the suspect in a recent mass shooting.
Homeland Security Chief Kristi Noem announced the immediate pause of the Diversity Visa Lottery programme on Thursday.
Noem stated the suspect in the Brown University shooting, Claudio Neves Valente, entered the US through the programme in 2017 and was granted a green card.
“At President Trump’s direction, I am immediately directing USCIS to pause the DV1 programme to ensure no more Americans are harmed by this disastrous programme,” Noem wrote on social media.
She added that the “heinous individual should never have been allowed in our country.”
Valente, a 48-year-old Portuguese national, is accused of a shooting at Brown University on 13 December that killed two and wounded nine.
He is also accused of killing a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology two days later.
Police said Valente was found dead by suicide on Thursday evening after a days-long manhunt.
The US green card lottery grants up to 55,000 permanent resident visas annually to people from countries with low US immigration rates.
Applicants must have at least a high school education or two years of relevant training or work experience.
They also undergo a vetting process that includes an interview. – AFP
