It promises to “unlock life in America.” And for $1 million, it can all be yours.
President Donald Trump has launched a website accepting applications for his “gold card” visa program, reflecting his vision of immigration as a pay-to-play scheme that attracts only the wealthiest people in the world.
A facsimile of the Trump Gold Card — bearing his face — emerges on the website from behind a mountain range with bald eagles flying above. “America’s opportunities accelerated,” the website says. “Unmatched Opportunities Await.”
While his administration strips legal status for tens of thousands of immigrants to fuel his mass deportation campaign, the president is promoting a program that allows wealthy foreigners to buy their way into the country with a “gift” of $1 million, what the president is calling a “a direct path to Citizenship for all qualified and vetted people.”
The “trumpcard.gov” government website promises legal U.S. residency “in record time” after a background check from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, a $15,000 processing fee to the Department of Homeland Security, and a $1 million payment to the government.
A first step in the process asks for the applicant’s name, address, phone number and other details before continuing to a payment page.
Individual applicants are required to pay $1 million, while businesses sponsoring employees are required to pay $2 million, according to the president’s September executive order.
Those companies must also pay an annual maintenance fee of $20,000, as well as a 5 percent transfer fee each time they want to switch the visa from one employee to another.
“SO EXCITING!” Trump wrote on his Truth Social on Wednesday. “Our Great American Companies can finally keep their invaluable Talent.”
Coming soon: a $5 million “platinum” card that gives recipients 270 days in the United States without being subject to U.S. taxes on non-U.S. income.
“This landmark program fulfills President Trump’s promise to attract the world’s most successful entrepreneurs and investors to America while guaranteeing they have skin in the game,” Homeland Security Secretary Kristie Noem said in a statement.
But anyone who pays the $1 million fee will be considered to have “exceptional business ability” for an employment-based visa, though there is nothing in the application process that stipulates that the money comes from one’s own business or employment.
It does not appear to prevent anyone from applying using money from a parent or family member, or from a loan.
The application also allows people to pay the fee using cryptocurrency.
The program applies to EB-1 visas, or foreign workers who are considered to have “extraordinary ability,” including in academia, arts, sciences, athletics and business, or who have otherwise demonstrated “outstanding” work in a certain field or as a multinational executive.
It also covers EB-2 visas, which apply to professionals with an advanced degree and those who have demonstrated “exceptional ability” in their field.
“We think these will be some tremendous people that wouldn’t be allowed to stay,” Trump said in remarks from the White House Wednesday.
“They graduate from college, they have to go back to India, they have to go back to China, they have to go back to France, they have to go back to wherever they came from,” he said. “It’s ridiculous. We are taking care of that. The companies are going to be very happy.”
And while the president touts the program as a pathway to citizenship, the website notes that it only confers legal residency.
All applicants must still be eligible for lawful permanent resident status in the United States, and a visa must be available to them — several countries have significant wait times of a year or longer, based on visa availability.
Those applying for lawful permanent status, or a green card, are currently facing wait times of more than three years, and immigrants seeking legal status in the country are often locked in years-long legal battles in immigration courts while continuing to pay taxes through their employment.
Trump’s Gold Card system appears to let applicants skip the line.
The president has taken a sledgehammer to the nation’s immigration system since taking office.
With a mandate to remove more than 1 million within his first year in office, Homeland Security has stripped legal status for hundreds of thousands of immigrants while the Department of Justice has directed immigration court judges to ensure immigrants can be swiftly arrested and placed in removal proceedings as soon as they leave their court hearings.
Within a matter of days after the suspected shooter of National Guard troops in Washington, D.C., was identified as an Afghan national, Trump rolled out a series of far-reaching policy changes, including freezing all asylum decisions, reviewing green cards belonging to people from 19 countries on his so-called travel ban list, and indefinitely blocking immigration applications from Afghan nationals, among other decisions.
