H-1B Lottery Lawsuit

Lawsuit Against H-1B Lottery: Case Seeks Information on the Lottery Process

The American Immigration Council has filed a lawsuit against USCIS, demanding transparency in the lottery process that affects the lives of hundreds of thousands of individuals and thousands of companies. With a statutory cap of 65,000 visas in the regular cap and 20,000 visas in the US Master’s cap, the over 230,000 applications that are submitted in the first week of April are subject to a lottery. However, there is no information on how that lottery works. Applications are submitted in early April and then receipt notices and lottery rejections trickle in over the next months.

In some years, the cap is not reached and there is no need for a lottery. However, for the past few years, the number of applications has been over 200,000 and the cap is reached in the first week of April. As this has become consistent, the need for lottery transparency has become urgent for the American Immigration Council. All that is known about the process is that it is random and computer generated. The lawsuit seeks to elicit more information from USCIS in how this process is conducted.