President Donald Trump on Thursday, December 18, ordered the suspension of the U.S. green card lottery program following revelations that the suspect in a series of deadly shootings had entered the country through the scheme.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem announced the move on the social platform X, saying she had directed U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services to pause the Diversity Visa Program at Trump’s instruction. She said the decision was driven by security concerns raised by the case.
Claudio Neves Valente, 48, a former Brown University student and Portuguese national, was allegedly responsible for shootings at Brown University that killed two students and wounded nine others, as well as the killing of an MIT(Massachusetts Institute of Technology) professor. But he was found dead Thursday evening from a self-inflicted gunshot wound, Providence police chief Col. Oscar Perez said.
According to an affidavit from a Providence police detective, Neves Valente first arrived in the United States in 2000 on a student visa to attend Brown University. He later took a leave of absence in 2001, and authorities say it remains unclear where he lived or traveled in the years that followed. In 2017, he was issued a diversity immigrant visa and subsequently obtained lawful permanent resident status.
The Diversity Visa Program, created by Congress, makes up to 50,000 green cards available each year through a lottery system aimed at individuals from countries with historically low levels of immigration to the United States, many of them in Africa. Because the program is enshrined in law, the administration’s decision to suspend it is widely expected to face legal challenges.
Nearly 20 million people applied for the 2025 diversity visa lottery, with more than 131,000 individuals selected when including spouses and family members. Selected applicants must undergo vetting before being allowed to enter the United States. Portuguese nationals were awarded just 38 slots in that lottery.
