There was a somewhat surprising ruling out of the Ninth Circuit yesterday that limits the scope of the Watson TRO to those meeting the same definition of a bona fide relationship with a US entity that the Supreme Court adopted last summer.
There is
speculation that the Supreme Court's bona fide relationship standard may persist until (or unless) Congress is someday motivated to step up and sort out this mess. Of course, the government could lose after a full trial in Watson's court, which could set up another window for those without bona fide relationships to apply.
My feelings on this remain conflicted. On one hand, requiring a bona fide relationship would be a reasonable reform for the overall diversity visa program. This year's diversity visa cycle winners from Iran et al knew very well that such a decision may be coming, and have sufficient time to form ties with US institutions like community colleges to potentially qualify under the guidelines that were adopted (and very inconsistently enforced) after the Supreme Court stay. However, enforcing it on such a small group of nationalities still feels discriminatory, and even insulting when "preventing foreign terrorist entry" is used as a justification for selecting those nationalities.
As for the very few tourists from Iran with the means to qualify for a US tourist visa in the absence of US ties or a SKN passport (or some other qualifying travel document), well, at least they won't have to suffer the indignity of the
DS-5535...