The Trump administration has suspended the U.S. green card lottery program used by the suspect in the Brown University and MIT shootings.

In a post late on the 18th, Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen stated, "Brown University shooter Claudio Manuel Neves Valente entered the United States through the 2017 diversity lottery immigrant visa program (DV1) and obtained permanent residency. This vicious individual should never have been allowed into our country."

Secretary Nielsen added, "In 2017, President Trump has been working to abolish this program after a tragedy where an ISIS terrorist who entered through the DV1 program committed a truck ramming attack in New York City, killing 8 people. As per President Trump's directive, I am immediately ordering the suspension of the DV1 program by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) so that Americans are no longer harmed by this disastrous program."

The hill reported that this visa lottery program was created by Congress, making it unclear whether President Trump has the authority to suspend it.

The DV1 visa program grants permanent residency through a random lottery for applicants who submit online during a designated period each year, provided they meet educational (high school diploma) or employment (at least two years of skilled work experience) requirements and are from countries with low immigration rates. Winners undergo thorough background checks and interviews at U.S. consulates to obtain their green cards.

The United States has implemented this program since enacting immigration law in 1990 during the administration of former President George H.W. Bush, providing approximately 50,000 green cards annually through a lottery. However, following the recent shooting incident, the DV1 program is now indefinitely suspended.

The shooting at Brown University resulted in the deaths of two students and injuries to nine others. Valente, believed to be the perpetrator, was found dead on Thursday night and is thought to be the same individual who murdered Nuno Loureiro, a nuclear physics professor at MIT.

Valente, 48, was a Portuguese national and a student at Brown University. His last known address was in Miami, Florida.

Leah Foley, a federal prosecutor in Massachusetts, stated that investigators believe the suspect participated in the same academic program as Loureiro in Portugal.

US NNP=Reporter Sung Ku Hong / Special Correspondent for this paper NNP info@newsandpost.com