A 'Trump Card Visa' Is Already Showing Up in Immigration Forms | Hacker News Reader

A 'Trump Card Visa' Is Already Showing Up in Immigration Forms

wired.com

50 pointsjaredwiener44 comments

Honest question: let’s say that Congress suddenly realizes what their job entails and what powers belong to them.

The article mentions that 1,000 of these visas have been sold and up to 1,000,000 may be.

If Congress says “no, this isn’t authorized” and the Supreme Court finally cracks open the Constitution and agrees with them: what does a rollback plan look like?

Probably the same as those students getting rolled up by ICE. Except it's a valet taking them to the executive terminal.

Probably a lot like putting down a $2K deposit on a Cybertruck range extender. If there's one thing Elon should be competent at by now, it's processing refunds.

The 1000 sold is very iffy. I'm not sure they have beyond a vague intention. I think it's just based on a comment Lutnick made on a podcast.

AFAIK a visa can be revoked for any reason. I’m also willing to wager that any costs would not be refunded because let’s be serious this is Trump we are talking about

That's normal. Pretty much no residency or citizenship by investment programs will refund the 'investment' unless it is denied during the initial application process.

People buying that stuff usually don't care and it doesn't seem to have much effect on the other programs, even ones that have cancelled even citizenships in the past (like Saint Lucia) without returning the 'investment.'

No law required ? Is Executive order sufficient to create new visa categories ?

The question isn’t “is this legal,” it’s “will anyone stop him.” Though in the end the answer to both is likely the same.

If it can be created by fiat, it can be destroyed by fiat.

This is the danger of most residency and citizenship by investment programs.

it's beyond just new a visa, it's also changing tax code.

> Lutnick told the hosts of the All In show, was to allow people to purchase the right to live in the United States and pay taxes only on their income earned in the country.

That's a huge tax policy change. Currently, my understanding is that as a citizen, you pay taxes on all income, regardless of where it comes from. You get credits for taxes paid to other governments, but if they charge less then the US would, you pay the difference.

So it's not just immigration fraud, but also tax evasion...

A VISA doesn't mean you are a citizen.

Being a Trump Card Holder may in the future become even better than being a citizen! How about even more, positive rights such as Judicial Express Review and deport override (at an extra fee, of course). The Platinum category gets permanent access to lawmakers offices.

One of my main complaints about the US is that basically corruption is less democratized, unlike a lot of places where it can be bought for a pittance. Trump bringing the bribery and corruption to the level of the common millionaire would be an invigorating breath of life into more equal opportunities usually reserved for billionares.

This is the trickle down economics we’ve been waiting for. Reagan was right all along!

Ah, but you see, these are VIP citizens. They are more equal than the other animals.

Paying $5 million to get a visa and then paying taxes on whatever assets and income they bring with them seems like a great deal for the US because the foreign income never would have been taxed by the US anyway if they hadn't got the visa. Why get greedy and demand taxation on all their income when this could lose us a the opportunity for a very profitable deal?

But is it fair that a foreigner can buy the state and profit of rules different than the country own citizens?

Let's push the concept further, if I'm a rich american citizen, that I leave the country and give up my nationality and then comes back with the trump gold card that I bought to profit of more interesting taxes conditions. Would it be fair?

Rich expats who hold visas and reside in a foreign country but don't pay taxes to that foreign country on their assets held back home is actually a very common thing around the world. This is encouraged because having rich people show up in your country and spend a lot of money is actually quite beneficial.

The outlier here is actually the US law that citizens pay taxes on income from outside the country. We are virtually the only country that does this. So in that sense I will agree with you that the unequal treatment is unfair, but it is the treatment of US citizens that is out of the ordinary, not the treatment of the Trump visa holders.

Having those visa rules in place would smooth a path to reforming the taxation of citizens.

Giving up US citizenship incurs a large exit tax, so that doesn't quite work.

Then again, give Trump a million for his 2028 campaign (am I kidding?) and who knows what could happen.

Why do they get something that ordinary US citizens don’t get?

Trump has already said that Gold Card holders will be exempt from taxes on foreign income[0].

Which shouldn't be surprising - no one wealthy enough to purchase this would do so if it came with any significant tax burden.

[0]https://kpmg.com/xx/en/our-insights/gms-flash-alert/flash-al...

It's a mixed blessing. The deal is very similar to remittance basis taxation which we had in the UK until recently. It probably benefited the country in the way you say but was also kind of unfair in that foreign billionaires living here got a much better deal than British ones. It was just scrapped and a lot of millionaires are leaving for better or worse.

I'm skeptical that Trump will manage to get the tax changes through the house and senate and that they would remain through the next government which might put people off dropping $5m on the thing.

Also would Musk who has three citizenships be able to drop the US one and get a gold visa?

Like it or not this is basically how the US is run these days. Congress has ceded its power to the executive branch. Almost everything now is done by bureaucratic degree and executive order.

"America is so unfair, in America only the rich are allowed to bribe public officials" -- Source unknown

Why would anyone buy this over participating in an EB-5 investor visa project?

Effort? EB-5 has ongoing reporting requirements.

And for some, $5M is not a significant sum.

You are more likely to get preferential treatment by the president.

If you're deferring to the favors of a figurehead rather than the law, you would be much better off in Dubai. Everyone knows the game there, it is pure dictatorship, but the taxes are extraordinarily low, banking and KYC/AML is laissez faire, and if you're going to depend on personal connections to a leader rather than immigration law then you may as well go all in and get the better end of the deal.

yes but then you have to live in dubai

In theory there are tax advantages.

Australia effectively scrapped this sort of visa in 2024 because it wasn't bringing the expected benefits. The UK did a similar thing because of it being exploited by oligarchs. (https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-68052626)

The European court of justice just concluded that Malta's golden visa program is illegal and needs to be stopped as well.

As far as I know, pretty much everyone who's tried this has ended up scrapping it; it _never_ works.

I think we are possibly looking for different benefits here. This time, it's just temporary cover for economic hardships. "The Trump cards will bring in so much money, later." Also, the point this time is to actually get the oligarchs into the hen house.

You know who has 5M dollars? Cartel.

Mirror around Wired Paywall: https://archive.is/jlTgv

Sounds like the people who take advantage of this illegal "Presidential offer" will become guilty of (A) immigration fraud and (B) tax evasion.

The current administration--as a principal criminal--may refuse to prosecute... but the statute of limitations will extend past Trump's term, and tax fraud has no statute of limitations.

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