The US State Department excluded Cuba from its Diversity Visa Program Immigrants 2026Popularly known as “Visa Lottery” or “The Hype”, it has been used by islanders for decades to immigrate permanently to the country.
program call It issues 55,000 permanent resident visas each year to people from countries with low immigration rates to the United States. This does not include island residents in fiscal year 2026.
Cubans appear in 20 nationalities excluding the new invitation More than 50,000 of its nationals have immigrated to the United States in the past five yearsState Department pointed out.
Cuba is the only country to join that exclusion listBangladesh, Brazil, Canada, China, Colombia, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Haiti, Honduras, India, Jamaica, Mexico, Nigeria, Pakistan, Philippines, South Korea, Venezuela and Vietnam have appeared over the years.
The United States promotes this initiative as a way to promote the cultural and national diversity of immigrants seeking permanent residency in that country.
Total in 2023 3,081 Cuban citizens benefited from this programMore than double the 1,358 received in 2022. Cuba then had the highest number of visa winners in all of Latin America, ahead of Peru, with 1,191; Ecuador, 466; Argentina, 133; Guatemala 84, Nicaragua 77.
“Pombo” is one of the main mechanisms for Cubans to immigrate permanently to the United States. The migrants took hundreds of thousands of the island's residents through Central America and Mexico to the country's southern border before leaving in November 2021.
however, Beginning in 2024, Washington established a humanitarian parole programIt also benefits Nicaraguans, Venezuelans and Haitians. According to official statistics, as of last July, about 106,757 Cubans benefited from this process and about 104,130 have already traveled to the United States.
So far, about 494,799 Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans, and Venezuelans have entered the United States under the program. By doing so, Washington seeks to prevent immigrants from those countries from crossing the border illegally.
