Maxwell Goodluck v. Joseph Biden, Jr.

United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued September 16, 2022 Decided June 25, 2024

No. 21-5263

MAXWELL GOODLUCK, ET AL.,

APPELLEES

v.

JOSEPH R. BIDEN, JR., IN HIS OFFICIAL CAPACITY AS PRESIDENT

OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, ET AL.,

APPELLANTS

Consolidated with 21-5270, 21-5271, 21-5272, 21-5277,

21-5288

Appeals from the United States District Court

for the District of Columbia

(No. 1:21-cv-01530)

(No. 1:21-cv-01874)

(No. 1:21-cv-00943)

(No. 1:21-cv-02228)

(No. 1:21-cv-02033)

(No. 1:21-cv-02071)

(No. 1:21-cv-00999)

2

Cara E. Alsterberg, Trial Attorney, U.S. Department of

Justice, argued the causes for appellants/cross-appellees. With

her on the briefs were Brian M. Boynton, Principal Deputy

Assistant Attorney General, and William C. Bateman, III, Anna

L. Dichter, Michelle M. Ramus, Eric C. Steinhart, James J.

Wen, and William H. Weiland, Trial Attorneys.

Jesse M. Bless and Rafael Urena argued the causes for

appellees. With them on the joint brief were Laboni A. Hoq,

Stephen W. Manning, Andrew J. Pincus, Carmen N. Longoria-

Green, Karen C. Tumlin, Esther H. Sung, Charles H. Kuck,

Nicolette Glazer, and Curtis Lee Morrison. Jennifer R.

Coberly entered an appearance.

Charles H. Kuck argued the cause and filed the brief for

appellees/cross-appellants.

Before: SRINIVASAN, Chief Judge, HENDERSON and

KATSAS, Circuit Judges.

Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge KATSAS.

KATSAS, Circuit Judge: In these four consolidated

appeals, district courts held that the Department of State had

unlawfully suspended, deprioritized, and delayed the

processing of applications for diversity visas for fiscal years

2020 and 2021, at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. As

a remedy, the courts ordered the Department to continue

processing applications and issuing visas after the statutory

deadlines for doing so had passed. We hold that the courts

lacked authority to order this relief.

3

I

A

The Immigration and Nationality Act creates an annual

allotment of immigrant visas for aliens from countries with low

rates of immigration to the United States. 8 U.S.C. § 1153(c).

These visas are known as diversity visas. Congress capped the

number of diversity visas at 55,000 per fiscal year. Id.

§ 1151(a)(3), (e).

The State Department administers the diversity-visa

program annually. Before the start of each fiscal year, it holds

a lottery for applicants from qualifying countries. 22 C.F.R.

§ 42.33. Millions of individuals apply. See Bureau of Consular

Affairs, U.S. Dep’t of State, Diversity Visa Program, DV 2019-

2021: Number of Entries During Each Online Registration

Period by Region and Country of Chargeability. From among

these applicants, the Department randomly selects a number

that it estimates will ensure filling the authorized diversity

visas “for the fiscal year in question.” 22 C.F.R. § 42.33(c).

Selectees become “eligible” to receive such visas “for the fiscal

year involved.” 8 U.S.C. § 1153(e)(2).

Selectees do not automatically receive visas. Rather, they

must submit a full, written application for an immigrant visa

and must personally appear for an interview before a consular

officer. See 22 C.F.R. §§ 40.1(l)(2), 42.33(g). They must

satisfy all admissibility requirements. See 8 U.S.C. § 1182(a).

They must also complete the application process and receive a

visa before “the end of the specific fiscal year for which they

were selected.” Id. § 1154(a)(1)(I)(ii)(II).

Selectees who timely complete the application process

may receive immigrant visas, provided that the annual cap of

55,000 visas is not exceeded. See 8 U.S.C. §§ 1151(a)(3),

4

1151(e), 1201(a)(1)(A). They then may travel to the United

States and seek admission. Id. § 1181(a). Like any other visa,

a diversity visa does not guarantee admission; instead, it

“merely gives the alien permission to arrive at a port of entry

and have an immigration officer independently examine the

alien’s eligibility for admission.” Saavedra Bruno v. Albright,

197 F.3d 1153, 1157 (D.C. Cir. 1999); see 8 U.S.C. § 1201(h).

B

The COVID pandemic significantly hampered the State

Department’s administration of the diversity-visa program.

Section 1182(f) of Title 8 permits the President to

“suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of aliens” whenever

he finds that their entry “would be detrimental to the interests

of the United States.” In April 2020, President Trump issued

Proclamation 10014, which suspended the entry of aliens to

protect domestic labor markets harmed by the pandemic. 85

Fed. Reg. 23,441 (Apr. 27, 2020). President Trump twice

extended Proclamation 10014, but President Biden revoked it

in February 2021. 85 Fed. Reg. 38,263 (June 25, 2020); 86

Fed. Reg. 417 (Jan. 6, 2021); 86 Fed. Reg. 11,847 (Mar. 1,

2021). During the ten months when the Proclamation remained

in effect, the State Department declined to issue diversity visas.

The Department took the position that a section 1182(f)

proclamation, by rendering covered aliens inadmissible, also

renders them ineligible for visas.

Around the same time, the Department also issued its own

guidance instructing consular officers how to respond to

COVID. In March 2020, the Department suspended all

“routine visa services”—including the processing of

applications for diversity visas—but permitted certain

“mission-critical visa services” to continue. J.A. 411. The

Department re-established more visa services over the summer,

5

but the pandemic hampered its efforts to reduce backlogs in

pending applications. In November 2020, the Department

instructed consular posts to follow a four-tiered prioritization

scheme for addressing the backlog, with diversity visas in the

lowest-priority tier. J.A. 2281–84. The Department rescinded

this guidance one year later.

C

The plaintiffs in these cases are selectees in the FY 2020

and 2021 diversity-visa lotteries. They contend that the State

Department policies noted above unlawfully prevented them

from receiving visas before the fiscal-year-end deadlines. The

district courts largely agreed. As a remedy, the courts ordered

the Department to prioritize processing and issuing diversity

visas past the end of the fiscal years.

The Gomez plaintiffs—a class of FY 2020 diversity-visa

selectees—sued in May 2020. On September 4, 2020, the

district court granted a preliminary injunction. Gomez v.

Trump, 485 F. Supp. 3d 145 (D.D.C. 2020) (Gomez I). At the

outset, the court held that the doctrine of consular non-

reviewability does not foreclose judicial review of the claims

at issue. Id. at 175–76. On the merits, the court first held that

a section 1182(f) proclamation likely does not make covered

aliens ineligible to receive visas. See id. at 191–94. Then, it

held that the Department likely had unreasonably delayed

processing the plaintiffs’ visa applications. Id. at 195–98.

Finally, it held that the Department’s guidance likely was

arbitrary because it did not adequately explain the exclusion of

diversity-visa processing from mission-critical services. Id. at

198–99. The court stayed the Department’s policy, ordered the

Department to “undertake good-faith efforts” to “expeditiously

process and adjudicate DV-2020 diversity visa and derivative

beneficiary applications,” and enjoined the Department from

6

directing consular personnel not to consider the diversity

program “mission critical.” Id. at 205.

On September 30, 2020—the last day of the fiscal year—

the court granted “supplemental equitable relief” ordering the

Department to “reserve” FY 2020 diversity visas for processing

and issuance after the end of the fiscal year. Gomez v. Trump,

490 F. Supp. 3d 276, 283 (D.D.C. 2020) (Gomez II). The court

ordered the Department to hold open 9,095 visas past the fiscal

year-end—a number it viewed as a “reasonable estimate” of

how many additional visas the Department would have issued

but for the policies that it found likely to be unlawful. See id.

at 288–90. Later, the court granted summary judgment to the

selectees and ordered the Department to process their visa

applications in a random order until it granted all the reserved

visas—and to finish the processing by September 30, 2022.

See Gomez v. Biden, No. 20-cv-01419, 2021 WL 3663535, at

*24 (D.D.C. Aug. 17, 2021) (Gomez III); J.A. 2342. The

Department appealed, and the district court stayed its order

pending resolution of the appeal.

The Goodluck, Goh, and Rai cases followed a similar

pattern with FY 2021 selectees as plaintiffs. Each group of

plaintiffs sued between March and June 2021. In each case, the

district court followed the substantive and remedial rulings in

Gomez. See J.A. 1531 (reserving 6,914 visas in Goodluck and

481 visas in Goh); J.A. 1424 (reserving 966 visas in Rai).

The Department appealed each case, and we consolidated

the four appeals. By cross-appeal, the Goh plaintiffs argued

that the district court should have reserved more visas for them.

II

On appeal, the parties debate at length the lawfulness of

how the State Department responded to Proclamation 10014

7

and more generally to the pandemic. The plaintiffs argue, and

the district courts held, that (1) a section 1182(f) proclamation

prevents entry into the United States but does not prevent the

issuance of visas; (2) the State Department guidance was

arbitrary; and (3) the Department unreasonably delayed the

processing of their visa applications. The government contests

these points. We need not resolve any of them because a fourth

contested issue is dispositive: The district courts had no

authority to require the Department to issue diversity visas past

the applicable statutory deadlines.

A

A court granting the equitable remedy of an injunction has

discretion to “mold its decree to meet the exigencies of the

particular case.” Trump v. Int’l Refugee Assistance Project,

582 U.S. 571, 580 (2017) (quoting 11A Wright & Miller,

Federal Practice and Procedure § 2947 (3d ed. 2013)). But

this discretion has limits. One is that courts cannot order relief

that conflicts with a clear and constitutionally valid statute.

See, e.g., Hedges v. Dixon Cnty., 150 U.S. 182, 192 (1893)

(“Courts of equity can no more disregard statutory and

constitutional requirements and provisions than can courts of

law.”); Rees v. City of Watertown, 86 U.S. (19 Wall.) 107, 122

(1874) (“A court of equity cannot, by avowing that there is a

right but no remedy known to the law, create a remedy in

violation of law ….”).1 Another limit is that, unless Congress

expressly provides otherwise, equitable remedies must track

remedies traditionally afforded by the equity courts. See Grupo

Mexicano de Desarrollo, S.A. v. Alliance Bond Fund, Inc., 527

U.S. 308, 318–19 (1999).

1

Because the plaintiffs here assert no constitutional claims, we

do not address equitable remedies for constitutional violations.

8

Two cases highlight these points. INS v. Pangilinan, 486

U.S. 875 (1988), involved a statute that made citizenship

available to aliens who had served in the United States military

during World War II, but only if they filed naturalization

petitions by December 31, 1946. Id. at 877–80. The plaintiffs

were Filipino nationals who had met the service requirement

but not filed timely petitions. See id. at 880–82. They argued

that for nine months before the statutory deadline, the United

States had unlawfully refused to appoint anyone in the

Philippines with authority to accept and process the required

petitions. See id. The Ninth Circuit agreed. See id. at 882.

Then, it asserted an “equitable authority to craft a remedy”

requiring the government to confer citizenship on the plaintiffs

despite the 1946 cutoff. Id. at 883.

The Supreme Court unanimously reversed this remedial

ruling. It stressed the longstanding principle that “[c]ourts of

equity can no more disregard statutory and constitutional

requirements and provisions than can courts of law.”

Pangilinan, 486 U.S. at 883 (quoting Hedges, 150 U.S. at 192).

Moreover, it reasoned, Congress had not conferred on the

federal courts “the power to make someone a citizen of the

United States,” unlike other expressly conferred equitable

powers “like mandamus or injunction.” Id. at 883–84. Thus,

the Ninth Circuit had erred by disregarding “the explicit cutoff

date” in the statute and ordering the conferral of citizenship

anyway. Id. at 884; see also id. at 885 (“Neither by application

of the doctrine of estoppel, nor by invocation of equitable

powers, nor by any other means does a court have the power to

confer citizenship in violation of these limitations.”).

Grupo Mexicano confirmed that equitable remedies must

be historically grounded absent express expansion by

Congress. As the Supreme Court explained, the federal courts’

general power to hear equitable claims is “an authority to

9

administer in equity suits the principles of the system of

judicial remedies which had been devised and was being

administered by the English Court of Chancery at the time of

the separation of the two countries.” 527 U.S. at 318 (quoting

Atlas Life Ins. Co. v. W.I. Southern, Inc., 306 U.S. 563, 568

(1939)). Thus, the “prerequisites for obtaining an equitable

remedy as well as the general availability of injunctive relief

… depend on traditional principles of equity jurisdiction.” Id.

at 318–19 (quoting 11A Wright & Miller, Federal Practice &

Procedure § 2941, at 31 (2d ed. 1995)). Of course, Congress

may authorize new remedies in “departure from past practice,”

so long as the remedies are consistent with Article III. Id. at

322. But absent such clear legislative action, courts

considering an equitable remedy “must ask” whether it “was

traditionally accorded by courts of equity.” Id. at 319.

B

The remedy ordered here—instructing the Executive

Branch to reserve, process, and issue visas on terms devised by

the courts—is irreconcilable with these settled principles.

Most obviously, it conflicts with the governing statutes.

As noted above, selectees in the diversity-visa lottery become

“eligible” to receive visas “for the fiscal year involved.” 8

U.S.C. § 1153(e)(2). Moreover, selectees “shall remain

eligible to receive such visa only through the end of the specific

fiscal year for which they were selected.” Id.

§ 1154(a)(1)(I)(ii)(II). And “[n]o visa or other documentation

shall be issued to an alien” if “the consular officer knows or has

reason to believe that such alien is ineligible to receive a visa.”

Id. § 1201(g). State Department regulations confirm these

statutory limits: “Under no circumstances may a consular

officer issue a visa or other documentation to an alien after the

end of the fiscal year during which an alien possesses diversity

10

visa eligibility.” 22 C.F.R. § 42.33(a)(1). In other words,

“when midnight strikes at the end of the fiscal year, those

applicants without visas are out of luck.” Yung-Kai Lu v.

Tillerson, 292 F. Supp. 3d 276, 282 (D.D.C. 2018). Or as the

Gomez court acknowledged, “[s]ection 1154 sets an absolute,

unyielding deadline by which selectees must receive their

visas.” Gomez I, 485 F. Supp. 3d at 196. And “this strict

interpretation of the diversity visa statute has been adopted by

every circuit court to have addressed the issue.” Yung-Kai Lu,

292 F. Supp. 3d at 282 (citing cases from the Second, Third,

Seventh, Ninth, and Eleventh Circuits).2 The district courts

here thus made the same error as the Ninth Circuit in

Pangilinan—invoking a supposed equitable power to override

an “explicit cutoff date” established by Congress. See 486 U.S.

at 884.

Historical and contextual considerations also warrant

restraint. The Supreme Court has long held that “any policy

toward aliens is vitally and intricately interwoven with” both

“the conduct of foreign relations” and “the war power”—and

so is “largely immune from judicial inquiry or interference.”

Harisiades v. Shaughnessy, 342 U.S. 580, 588–89 (1952).

More particularly, it is “not within the province of any court,

2

See Coraggioso v. Ashcroft, 355 F.3d 730, 734 (3d Cir. 2004)

(“The phrase ‘only through the end of the specific year’

unambiguously indicates Congress’s intent to impose a time deadline

on an applicant’s eligibility ….”); Nyaga v. Ashcroft, 323 F.3d 906,

914 (11th Cir. 2003) (“the phrase ‘shall remain eligible to receive

such visa’ plainly means that aliens … who have been randomly

selected to qualify for a visa under the diversity visa program cannot

be issued a visa after midnight of the final day of the fiscal year for

which they were selected”); accord Mohamed v. Gonzales, 436 F.3d

79, 80–81 (2d Cir. 2006); Carrillo–Gonzalez v. INS, 353 F.3d 1077,

1079 (9th Cir. 2003); Iddir v. INS, 301 F.3d 492, 500–01 (7th Cir.

2002).

11

unless expressly authorized by law, to review the determination

of the political branch of the Government to exclude a given

alien.” United States ex rel. Knauff v. Shaughnessy, 338 U.S.

537, 543 (1950). Modern statutes, apart from the specific

deadline directly at issue here, point in the same direction. For

one thing, Congress has made decisions by consular officers to

deny visas to aliens outside the United States not reviewable

even by the Secretary of State. 6 U.S.C. § 236(b)(1). For

another, while Congress has provided for judicial review of the

removal of aliens present in the United States, 8 U.S.C. § 1252,

it has expressly refused to afford judicial review for aliens

outside the country “to challenge a decision of a consular

officer … to grant or deny a visa.” 6 U.S.C. § 236(f). This

general framework, plus the sensitivities noted above, undercut

any contention that courts may order the processing and

issuance of visas to aliens whom Congress has specifically

made ineligible.

In sum, the statutory deadline is clear, and neither history

nor context affords any basis for departing from it. The district

courts had no authority to order the State Department to keep

processing applications for diversity visas and issuing the visas

beyond the end of the relevant fiscal years.3

C

The plaintiffs make several arguments in defense of the

remedial orders, but none of them is convincing.

3

Before this Court, the government no longer presses an

argument that the doctrine of consular non-reviewability bars judicial

review in this case. Cf. Saavedra Bruno, 197 F.3d at 1159–62.

Accordingly, we do not consider that question.

12

1. The plaintiffs seek to distinguish Pangilinan as a case

involving the conferral of citizenship, not the processing and

issuance of visas. It is true, as this Court once observed, that

the conferral of citizenship was the “only form of relief

specifically disapproved” in Pangilinan. In re Thornburgh,

869 F.2d 1503, 1517 (D.C. Cir. 1989). But the Supreme Court

reasoned more generally; its decision rested on the broad

principle that “[c]ourts of equity can no more disregard

statutory and constitutional requirements and provisions than

can courts of law.” Pangilinan, 486 U.S. at 883 (quoting

Hedges, 150 U.S. at 192). Moreover, the rule that equitable

relief cannot violate statutes is amply supported by other cases

outside the citizenship and immigration context. See, e.g.,

United States v. Oakland Cannabis Buyers’ Coop, 532 U.S.

483, 497 (2001) (“a court sitting in equity cannot ignore the

judgment of Congress, deliberately expressed in legislation”

(cleaned up)); Weinberger v. Romero-Barcelo, 456 U.S. 305,

313 (1982) (Congress may “guide or control the exercise of the

courts’ [remedial] discretion”). Furthermore, while the district

courts here did not order the granting of diversity visas to any

individual alien or group of aliens, the Gomez court did order

continued processing of visa applications “until all 9,905

[reserved] diversity visas have been granted.” Gomez III, 2021

WL 3663535, at *24. This order—entered on the last day of

the fiscal year—necessarily required the Secretary to violate an

unqualified statutory deadline, which Congress imposed in a

context where courts owe a high degree of respect to the

judgments of the political branches.

2. The plaintiffs invoke Almaqrami v. Pompeo, 933 F.3d

774 (D.C. Cir. 2019). In that case, selectees for fiscal year 2017

sought diversity visas despite a presidential proclamation

barring their entry into the United States. Id. at 777–78. On

September 29, 2017, the district court ordered the State

Department to reserve unused FY 2017 diversity visas so that

13

the Department could process pending applications and issue

visas if the Supreme Court were to invalidate the proclamation.

Id. at 778. After the end of the fiscal year, the proclamation

expired, and the Supreme Court held that challenges to it were

moot. See id. at 779. The district court then dismissed the

claims for the diversity visas as moot, and the plaintiffs

appealed. Id.

In this Court, the government argued for mootness on the

ground that, once the plaintiffs lost their eligibility for diversity

visas at the end of the fiscal year, the courts could no longer

afford any meaningful relief. Almaqrami, 933 F.3d at 780. We

held that the case did not become moot on that basis. We

explained that arguments about “the legal availability of a

certain kind of relief” go to the merits—not mootness—unless

the remedy is “so implausible that it is insufficient to preserve

jurisdiction.” Id. at 781 (cleaned up). We noted two cases

where district courts had “invoked [an] equitable power to

enforce prior orders and instructed the government to issue the

plaintiffs [diversity] visas even though the selection FY had

ended.” Id. at 780. Given those cases, we held that the claim

for relief remained at least plausible enough to support Article

III jurisdiction. See id. at 782. We therefore remanded for the

district court to consider the merits. Id. at 784.

Our decision does not help the plaintiffs. We held only

that the validity of a visa-reservation remedy was not so

implausible as to moot a pending case. We did not decide the

merits question whether district courts may order such a

remedy despite the clear eligibility cutoff at the end of the fiscal

year. Now, we decide that question in the negative.

3. The plaintiffs also cite the district-court decisions

ordering the government to process diversity-visa applications

and issue the visas after the year-end deadline. See

14

Przhebelskaya v. USCIS, 338 F. Supp. 2d 399, 403–06

(E.D.N.Y. 2004); Paunescu v. INS, 76 F. Supp. 2d 896, 902–

03 (N.D. Ill. 1999). These decisions reason that courts may

extend the eligibility deadline so long as they act before the

deadline has run. But we fail to see how the timing of a court

order can matter, for the deadline is keyed to receipt of a visa:

In unambiguous and unqualified terms, Congress provided that

diversity-visa selectees “shall remain eligible to receive such

visa only through the end of the specific fiscal year for which

they were selected.” 8 U.S.C. § 1154(a)(1)(I)(ii)(II) (emphasis

added). Thus, it does not matter whether a selectee has

submitted the required documents, filed a lawsuit, obtained

some form of preliminary relief, or done anything else short of

receiving the visa; at the end of the fiscal year, “those

applicants without visas are out of luck.” Yung-Kai Lu, 292 F.

Supp. 3d at 282.

4. In Gomez, the district court analogized to the courts’

power to make government funds available beyond the end of

the relevant appropriation. Gomez II, 490 F. Supp. 3d at 285–

86. We have held that a court may “award funds based on an

appropriation even after the date when the appropriation lapses,

so long as the lawsuit was instituted on or before that date.”

City of Houston v. HUD, 24 F.3d 1421, 1426 (D.C. Cir. 1994)

(cleaned up). Our decisions in this area trace back to an

assertion that courts may “suspend the operation of a lapse

provision” because their equitable powers “allow them to take

action to preserve the status quo of a dispute and to protect their

ability to decide a case properly before them.” Nat’l Ass’n of

Reg’l Councils v. Costle, 564 F.2d 583, 588 (D.C. Cir. 1977).

But in the appropriations context, Congress has expressly

authorized courts to suspend the lapse of budget authority

while lawsuits play out. See 31 U.S.C. § 1502(b) (“A provision

of law requiring that the balance of an appropriation or fund be

returned to the general fund of the Treasury at the end of a

15

definite period does not affect the status of lawsuits or rights of

action involving the right to an amount payable from the

balance.”). This authority has existed at least since 1973. See

Pub. L. No. 97–258, § 1502(b), 96 Stat. 877, 928 (1982); Pub.

L. No. 93-52, § 111, 87 Stat. 130, 134 (1973). Here, in

contrast, Congress gave the courts no analogous authority to

suspend visa-eligibility deadlines to accommodate pending

lawsuits, instead imposing an unqualified prohibition on the

issuance of visas past the deadline.

We recognize that our appropriations cases, which

originated in the mid-1970s, assert an equitable authority

unmoored from section 1502(b) or its antecedents. See, e.g.,

Nat’l Ass’n of Reg’l Councils, 564 F.2d at 588–89; Jacksonville

Port Auth. v. Adams, 556 F.2d 52, 55–57 (D.C. Cir. 1977). But

this reasoning provides thin support for the plaintiffs’ position.

These cases were decided during the “ancien regime” when

courts took a much more freewheeling approach to the law of

remedies. See Ziglar v. Abbasi, 582 U.S. 120, 131–32 (2017);

Alexander v. Sandoval, 532 U.S. 275, 287 (2001). Since then,

the Supreme Court repeatedly has stressed the limits on the

federal courts’ equitable powers in cases like Pangilinan,

Grupo Mexicano, and Oakland Cannabis. And this more

recent guidance indicates that a court may not override clear

statutory limits on visa eligibility without some other statutory

authority—akin to section 1502(b)—for doing so.

5. The plaintiffs object that agency delay should not

frustrate their interest in obtaining diversity visas. Yet the

plaintiffs have nothing resembling a substantive entitlement to

such visas. Congress has imposed a ceiling, but not a floor, on

the number of diversity visas to be issued each fiscal year. See

8 U.S.C. § 1151(a)(3), (e). Selectees still must complete the

process of applying for an immigrant visa, see 22 C.F.R.

§§ 40.1(l)(2), 42.33(g), and must satisfy all admissibility

16

requirements, see 8 U.S.C. § 1182(a). They must compete with

other selectees for the limited number of visas: In fiscal year

2020, the Department chose over 90,000 selectees (including

derivative beneficiaries) to compete for the 55,000 available

visas. J.A. 2353–54. In fiscal year 2021, the Department chose

over 137,000 selectees and beneficiaries. Id. The selectees

also must obtain a visa before the end of the fiscal year. 8

U.S.C. § 1154(a)(1)(I)(ii)(II). On the other hand, decisions

regarding the prioritization and processing of visa

applications—like decisions regarding the issuance or denial of

visas—implicate weighty concerns of foreign policy and

national security. See Harisiades, 342 U.S. at 588–89; Knauff,

340 U.S. at 543. Given all of this, we find it neither surprising

nor concerning that Congress left administration of the

diversity-visa program primarily in the hands of the Executive

Branch. And we see no basis for judges to invoke equity to

override the temporal or other limitations that Congress has

expressly built into the diversity-visa program.4

In a slight variation on this theme, the plaintiffs raise a

specter that enforcement of the statutory deadline would enable

the government “to avoid the full impact of court orders by

simply dragging its feet.” Joint Brief for Plaintiffs-Appellees

at 83, Goodluck v. Biden, No. 21-5263 (June 9, 2022). But the

initial injunction in this case, entered before the end of the

4

The diversity-visa program is unlike the visa program at issue

in Afghan & Iraqi Allies v. Blinken, No. 23-5025 (D.C. Cir. June 7,

2024). There, instead of imposing a firm deadline by which

applicants had to obtain their visas, Congress imposed a presumptive

deadline by which the State Department had to adjudicate the

relevant visa applications. See id., slip op. at 3–4. We relied in

significant part on that deadline in affirming a decision regarding

unreasonable agency delay. See id., slip op. at 13–14. In both cases,

our decisions respect Congress’s judgment about the adjudication of

visa applications.

17

relevant fiscal year, merely required the government to

“undertake good-faith efforts” to process diversity-visa

applications “expeditiously” and until the end of the fiscal year.

Gomez I, 485 F. Supp. 3d at 205. The plaintiffs here do not

contend that the government violated that obligation, much less

that they did so willfully. Accordingly, we need not consider

whether, if there were such a case of bad faith or undue delay

in complying with a timely entered injunction, the district court

could issue contempt sanctions against the government even if

it could not grant relief directly to visa applicants past the end

of the fiscal year.5

III

Once Fiscal Years 2020 and 2021 ended, the plaintiffs lost

their eligibility for diversity visas. The district courts erred in

asserting an equitable authority to override these clear statutory

deadlines, which foreclose the prospective relief sought in

these cases. Accordingly, we reverse the remedial orders

challenged by the government, reject the Goh cross-appeal, and

remand the cases with instructions to enter judgment for the

government.

So ordered.

5

Our holding that the district courts had no remedial authority

to order the government to process visa applications and grant visas

after the statutory deadlines disposes of the Goh plaintiffs’ argument

on cross-appeal that the district court there reserved too few visas.