Noem Moves to Pause Visa Program That Brown University and MIT Shooter Used to Enter US 

The suspect in the Brown University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor shootings entered the U.S. through an immigrant visa program, according to Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem. Now, the secretary is pausing the program.  

“The Brown University shooter, Claudio Manuel Neves Valente entered the United States through the diversity lottery immigrant visa program (DV1) in 2017 and was granted a green card,” Noem wrote on X late Thursday night.  

“This heinous individual should never have been allowed in our country,” she added.  

President Donald Trump sought to end the diversity visa program in 2017 following a terrorist attack in New York City that left eight people dead. The terrorist, who used his vehicle to plow down civilians, entered the U.S. in 2010 through the diversity visa program. 

“At President Trump’s direction, I am immediately directing [United States Citizenship and Immigration Services] to pause the DV1 program to ensure no more Americans are harmed by this disastrous program,” Noem said.  

The Diversity Immigrant Visa Program provides up to 50,000 immigrant visas every year. The visa winners are drawn at random “among all entries to individuals who are from countries with low rates of immigration to the United States,” according to USCIS.  

After Trump called for an end to the visa program, Republican members of Congress made efforts to end it, but were “stopped by [Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.,] and Democrats,” according to DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin.  

In 2020, Trump suspended the processing of the diversity visas, but “then, of course, President [Joe] Biden turned it back on,” McLaughlin said.  

Authorities found the Brown shooter suspect dead in a storage unit in Salem, New Hampshire on Thursday. Officials say Valente, 48 and a Portuguese national, died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.  

Claudio Manuel Neves Valente, suspect in the Brown University shooting in Providence. (U.S. Attorney Massachusetts/Handout via REUTERS)

On Dec. 13, a shooter opened fire in a lecture hall at Brown University, killing 19-year-old Ella Cook and 18-year-old Muhammad Aziz Umurzakov and injuring nine others. Two days later, MIT professor Nuno Loureiro was found dead in his home in Brookline, Massachusetts.  

Valente is the suspect in both shootings, according to authorities.  

“Neves Valente was enrolled at Brown as a graduate student from fall 2000 to spring 2001, but he has no active affiliation with Brown and has not been affiliated with Brown since 2003,” according to the University.  

Valente attended Brown for three semesters but never received a degree from the university, according to Brown.  

The MIT professor and Valente were both Portugal natives and, according to U.S. Attorney for Massachusetts Leah Foley, both men attended the same academic program in Portugal between 1995 and 2000.  

The investigation into Valente’s motives in both deadly shootings is ongoing.  

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