Trump's $5 million 'Gold Card Visa': Fast-track to US citizenship for super rich

India Today

US President Donald Trump announced a 'Gold Card Visa' costing $5 million for citizenship, replacing the investor visa programme.

Transcript

00:00US President Donald Trump has announced that he plans to offer what he calls a

00:06gold card visa with a path to citizenship. It's only going to cost you

00:13five million dollars. It's incredible but he actually said it and he means it. He

00:19says he's going to be rolling it out in just a couple of weeks from now. He says

00:24this gold card visa with a path to citizenship for which you have to pay

00:28five million dollars replaces a 35 year old visa for investors. However the move

00:35if it comes into effect will compound possibly the woes of skilled Indian

00:41professionals stuck in long green card queues and backlogs. The program this

00:47gold card program driven by Trump's everything's business mindset is likely

00:52to come into effect by April with around 10 million such gold card visas likely

00:57to be up for grabs initially. This proposed gold card visa scheme raises

01:02the financial requirement by five times to five million dollars. That's a huge

01:08amount. Hefty price makes it out of reach for middle-tier investors despite being

01:14a much faster and simpler route to getting US residency. The job creation

01:19requirement is also done away with making it hassle-free. It's basically

01:24cash and gaddy towards citizenship of the United States. We're going to be

01:30doing something else that's got to be very very good. We're going to be selling

01:35a gold card. You have a green card. This is a gold card. We're going to be putting

01:42a price on that card of about five million dollars and that's going to give

01:46you green card privileges plus. It's going to be a route to citizenship and

01:51wealthy people will be coming into our country by buying this card. They'll be

01:55wealthy and they'll be successful and they'll be spending a lot of money and

01:59paying a lot of taxes and employing a lot of people and we think it's going to

02:03be extremely successful and never been done before anything like this but it's

02:07something that we're going to be putting out over the next would you say two

02:10weeks out? You want to say a couple of words about it? To end the EB-5 program we're

02:14going to replace it with the Trump gold card which is really a green card gold

02:20so they'll be able to pay five million dollars to the US government. They'll have to go

02:24through vetting of course. We're going to make sure they're wonderful world-class

02:27global citizens. They can come to America. The president can give them a green card

02:32and they can invest in America and we can use that money to reduce our

02:38deficit. Why do we give out lotteries of green cards? Why do we give out EB-5 for

02:43green cards? The President of the United States understands that the right answer is why

02:48don't we eliminate the deficit of the United States of America. I want to go

02:53across to India Today's foreign affairs editor Geeta Mohan for more on this. You

02:57know Geeta, whenever one hears an announcement of this kind from Donald

03:02Trump you know you have to remind yourself that it is the US president

03:06speaking. This is in some ways outlandish but very much keeping with

03:12Brand Trump looking to disrupt you know one of his pet subjects which is people

03:18coming into the United States. Just break this down for us. You know is this

03:22is this a citizenship yojana that is going to disrupt other avenues for

03:29citizenship in the United States? What exactly is this about? Five million

03:33dollars is an enormous amount of money. Well absolutely but it is a while it is

03:38going to be a huge disruptor. It will certainly not affect those who are going

03:44through the professional route which is H-1B visa. We've heard Elon Musk, we've

03:49heard Vivek Ramaswamy talk about and justify the need for H-1B visas

03:55particularly when it comes to Indians. There are many Indians who are not

03:58looking at citizenship. They would like to go work there and yes there's a

04:02longer route to a green card which a lot of people might want to wait but this is

04:08very very Trump like to have not just a disruptor but also to increase the value.

04:15He's saying that one million dollar is not not worth America's while and if you

04:22want to be an American citizenship by investment then looking at five million

04:26dollars he's increased the cap from eight hundred thousand to two to ten

04:30million which is a huge number. There are a lot of people who are looking at

04:35American citizenship and might have the money. In a way he's trying to maybe look

04:41at containing illegal immigration but people who go to America via the illegal

04:49routes do not have this kind of money. And the ones who have this kind of

04:53money would be willing to pay if should they want to give up their citizenship

04:57or have dual citizenship. So a disruptor but right now if you look at the initial

05:03stages what does it entail? Do you have to create jobs? It does not have any

05:09details on job requirement. EB5 did. You had to employ people in the United

05:15States of America. So there are a lot of details that are still missing. We'll have to wait and see what

05:19those details are going to look like for now. It looks like a proposition where

05:23Trump is only looking at reducing the deficit in the United States of

05:29America. Will that really invite a lot of people to pay five million dollars

05:33for citizenship in the United States of America? We'll have to wait and see. How

05:37will it impact Indians especially professionals as of now? Because they

05:42have not cancelled H1B visas, they remain unaffected. Okay and also the you

05:47know there's lack of clarity on whether this will impact. Obviously this is you

05:50know completely separate from the illegal immigration conundrum that Trump

05:55is cracking down on but will there be a spillover effect or you know augmented

06:01delays as far as the huge backlog for green cards is concerned? As Geeta said

06:06there is little clarity on that but hopefully we'll get that soon. But this

06:10is this is signature Trump. This is you know he's gonna put out just a big

06:13headline and then maybe the details will come out later and either make

06:18everything more dramatic or actually make everything more sober. Let's try and

06:21understand this because because the proposition itself is tantalizing.

06:26Earlier it was 800,000 you know for professionals wanting to move to the

06:30United States to create jobs. Now Trump is basically saying forget about all the

06:35other conditions. If you can fork out five million dollars cash up front then

06:40you get a green card plus and that puts you on some kind of a fast track towards

06:46citizenship of the United States which is of course the big holy grail of what

06:50many people going to the United States are really aiming for.

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