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"They’ll be wealthy and they’ll be successful, and they’ll be
spending a lot of money and paying a lot of taxes and employing
a lot of people, and we think it’s going to be extremely
successful,” Trump said in the Oval Office.
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said the “Trump Gold Card”
would replace EB-5 visas in two weeks. EB-5s were created by
Congress in 1990 to generate foreign investment and are
available to people who spend about $1 million on a company that
employs at least 10 people.
Lutnick said the gold card — actually a green card, or permanent
legal residency — would raise the price of admission for
investors and do away with fraud and “nonsense” that he said
characterize the EB-5 program. Like other green cards, it would
include a path to citizenship.
About 8,000 people obtained investor visas in the 12-month
period ending Sept. 30, 2022, according to the Homeland Security
Department's most recent Yearbook of Immigration Statistics. The
Congressional Research Service reported in 2021 that EB-5 visas
pose risks of fraud, including verification that funds were
obtained legally.
Investors’ visas are common around the world. Henley & Partners,
an advisory firm, says more than 100 countries around the world
offer “golden visas” to wealthy individuals, including the
United States, United Kingdom, Spain, Greece, Malta, Australia,
Canada and Italy.
Trump made no mention of the requirements for job creation. And,
while the number of EB-5 visas is capped, Trump mused that the
federal government could sell 10 million “gold cards” to reduce
the deficit. He said it “could be great, maybe it will be
fantastic.”
“It’s somewhat like a green card, but at a higher level of
sophistication, it’s a road to citizenship for people, and
essentially people of wealth or people of great talent, where
people of wealth pay for those people of talent to get in,
meaning companies will pay for people to get in and to have
long, long term status in the country,” he said.
Congress determines qualifications for citizenship, but Trump
said “gold cards” would not require congressional approval.
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