Trump introduces 'Gold Card' scheme for US citizenship

India Today

Trump's 'Gold Card' plan for US citizenship costs $5 million per card, aiming to attract wealthy immigrants.

Transcript

00:00Now, amid a showdown in America over Trump's crackdown on illegal immigration, Trump has

00:07now called for super rich migrants to be in America.

00:13He is now proposing that you can actually buy US citizenship.

00:16According to Trump, you can pay $5 million and get what he calls a gold card for US citizenship.

00:24This is an equivalent of a green card essentially, but Trump has called it a gold card saying

00:29if you pay up $5 million, we will go ahead and give you a gold card for US citizenship.

00:35And Trump has said that he proposes to sell about 1 million of these gold cards, each

00:41costing $5 million.

00:43So imagine the kind of money that America will make from this scheme.

00:47We'll have to see whether it actually happens, but he has said Trump claims that this will

00:51become a reality very, very soon.

00:58We're going to be doing something else.

00:59It's going to be very, very good.

01:01We're going to be selling a gold card.

01:06You have a green card.

01:07This is a gold card.

01:09We're going to be putting a price on that card of about $5 million, and that's going

01:13to give you green card privileges.

01:15Plus, it's going to be a route to citizenship and wealthy people will be coming into our

01:21country by buying this card.

01:22They'll be wealthy and they'll be successful and they'll be spending a lot of money and

01:26paying a lot of taxes and employing a lot of people.

01:30And we think it's going to be extremely successful and never been done before.

01:34Anything like this.

01:35But it's something that we're going to be putting out over the next, would you say two

01:38weeks out?

01:39You want to say a couple of words about OK, let's bring in Shashank Mathur for more details

01:45on this.

01:46Shashank, this seems to be Trump's bid to earn a few bucks from, in fact, having citizenship

01:52being given out, not a green card, but what Trump calls a gold card.

01:56Is this something that's actually feasible, something that can actually become a reality?

01:59Well, actually, there are a lot of countries around the world that do something like this.

02:04Canada has a system, Germany has a system, Greece, Ireland, Italy, a number of countries

02:08around the world have pathways, visa pathways for wealthy individuals from around the world,

02:14investors to come put money into their economies and they get residency and then that leads

02:19to citizenship.

02:20The United States itself has what's known as the EB-5 program, which allows you to come

02:24to the United States, gain a green card and then move on to citizenship.

02:28If you invest around a million dollars or so in targeted areas where there's unemployment,

02:33if you create jobs for Americans, you're allowed to come in and get that visa.

02:36So America already has a system like that.

02:38And this golden visa system that Donald Trump is going to be talking about is going to replace

02:42that EB-5 program.

02:43But it has been extremely controversial in the past.

02:45There are ethical concerns about whether U.S. citizenship or residency should be sold in

02:49such a manner where people, for example, green card holders or H-1B visa holders like the

02:54thousands of Indian-Americans who work in America, they have to wait for long periods

02:58of time.

02:59Isn't it unethical to be giving people a shortcut to cut through the line and get a visa?

03:03So there are ethical concerns.

03:04There are concerns about fraud and abuse.

03:06Donald Trump mentioned that Russian oligarchs, for example, would be free to also come in

03:11and invest their money, some of which may be dirty money, and put it into the American

03:16economy.

03:17This fraud and abuse is also a concern with the EB-5 program.

03:19And it has been controversial in the past couple of years.

03:22This idea of giving rich people, basically, a pathway to citizenship in America.

03:26So it has been controversial.

03:27But Donald Trump is a powerful president at this point in time.

03:30And this battle, therefore, will continue about whether America can, in fact, set up

03:34this golden visa scheme.

03:35Okay, Shashank, thanks very much for joining us with those details.

03:40Let's see really what happens.

03:41I'm sure there'll be a lot of Indians who can afford to spend that kind of money who

03:45will be watching very, very closely whether this is an option for them to buy a gold card

03:50to U.S. citizenship.

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