John Curley: Will Trump’s gold card bump or dump the economy?

President Donald Trump said that he plans to offer a “gold card” visa with a path to citizenship for $5 million, replacing a 35-year-old visa for investors.

“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 Tuesday 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.

John Curley supports gold card program

John Curley, host of “The John Curley Show” on KIRO Newsradio, gave his opinion on the gold cards.

John highlighted that the gold card program might be a good opportunity to grow the economy by offering citizenship to foreign investors in exchange for success in the United States.

“Yikes, it’s going to be too hard to start a business, too hard to power that business … but look at that in the United States, they’re not really following along, so we’re going to put the money over there,” he said. “So Trump’s trying to do something to grow the economy.”

To listen to the full discussion, click the player below:

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More on investor visas

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.

Curley mentioned that this could easily help reinvest foreign money into the U.S. economy.

“So they are now thinking, I’ll take my money and stick it in the US, as opposed to sticking it in the bank down the street or in the business down the street,” said Curley.

Trump made no mention of the requirements for job creation. And, while the number of EB-5 visas is capped, the Republican president 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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Contributing: Associated Press; MyNorthwest 

Listen to John Curley on “The John Curley Show” weekday afternoons from 3-7 p.m. on KIRO Newsradio.