US Court Orders 2027 Green Card Lottery Reopened, Sets 3 Deadlines

A US federal court ordered the Trump administration on October 14, 2026, to reopen the 2027 Diversity Visa Green Card Lottery, restoring a programme that grants roughly 55,000 visas each year. US District Judge Jinsook Ohta issued a preliminary injunction directing Secretary of State Marco Rubio and the State Department to revive the draw for nationals of countries that historically send few immigrants to the United States.

The ruling sets three hard deadlines: the State Department must publish registration details by October 29, open the registration window by November 1, 2026, and notify selected applicants by December 3. The final visa processing deadline stays at September 30, 2027. Whether all three dates hold is now the open question, because the administration has filed an appeal.

How did the lottery nearly disappear?

The dispute began in November 2025, when the State Department quietly postponed the registration window for the 2027 cycle without giving any clear timeline for resuming it. Law firm Red Eagle Law, led by attorney Curtis Morrison, took the matter to court and argued that the missing window had shut the programme down in practice.

"The government's failure to reopen the period resulted in a de facto cancellation of the programme," Morrison told the court. Judge Ohta agreed with that reading and issued the injunction on that basis.

Morrison has cautioned that a reopened registration window is not the finish line. "We're not going to let that happen again with DV-2027," he said, stressing that the court victory must lead to actual visa processing and physical entry into the United States for winners. In plain terms: the draw is back on paper, but applicants still need the process to run to the end.

Who can apply and what changes for them?

Winning a place in the lottery does not guarantee permanent residence. Selected applicants must meet clear thresholds:

• Hold at least a qualifying secondary school certificate, or show relevant work experience
• Meet standard admissibility requirements, including no prior immigration violations and no criminal record
• No job offer is required at the point of application

The eligibility rules themselves have not changed under the ruling; what changes is that a registration window for the 2027 cycle must now open. African applicants carry particular weight in this story, having become some of the programme's largest beneficiary groups over the decades.

The programme rests on the Immigration Act of 1990, signed into law by President George H.W. Bush. Former Representative Bruce Morrison, who helped draft the legislation, described its purpose plainly: "There is no better antidote to the challenges of globalisation than to attract the 'self-selected strivers' from every corner of the globe."

Will the appeal stop the deadlines?

Not automatically. Legal observers note that filing an appeal neither suspends Judge Ohta's injunction nor guarantees its reversal. For now, the 2027 lottery remains open and the court-ordered dates stand, pending further court action.

Applicants should treat the State Department's official announcements as the authoritative source for registration dates and instructions, since the appeal could alter the timetable. The takeaway: the draw is legally alive again, with November 1, 2026 as the date to watch for the window to open.