Trump 'Gold Card' Proclamation – Background and Implications

The Trump administration’s “Gold Card” program was announced on September 19,2025 alongside the much-debated $100,000 H-1B fee. While most headlines focused on the H-1B change and its implications for tech employers, the Gold Card proclamation quietly introduced a brand-new pathway for wealthy individuals and corporations.

The idea is straightforward: instead of building a thick petition of awards, publications, media citations, and national interest arguments, an applicant can make a $1 million personal gift or a $2 million corporate gift to the U.S. government. The proclamation then instructs the Secretary of State and the Secretary of Homeland Security to treat that gift as sufficient “evidence” of extraordinary ability (EB-1A), exceptional ability (EB-2), or eligibility for a national interest waiver (EB-2 NIW). In the corporate version, the benefit can even be reassigned from one worker to another if the original employee leaves, making it resemble a transferable sponsorship slot.

From the perspective of an investor or employer, the attraction is predictability. A normal EB-1A or NIW case can be subjective — adjudicators weigh letters of recommendation, publications, and impact evidence. The Gold Card shortcut promises expedited adjudication and certainty: the gift itself substitutes for merit evidence, and petitions are processed on a premium track. The executive order even directs agencies to set administrative fees to fund the expedited handling.

But there are two key legal and practical caveats. First, the Gold Card doesn’t create new visas. It still operates inside the employment-based green card quotas in 8 U.S.C. § 1151: 140,000 EB visas a year worldwide, with about 40,000 each for EB-1 and EB-2, and no more than 7% (~2,800) available to any single country unless there is spillover. For applicants from countries without backlogs, that could mean a smooth and fairly quick path to permanent residence. But for nationals of India and China — who already exceed their per-country caps — a Gold Card approval may just mean a fast I-140, followed by years of waiting for a visa number to become available. Unless agencies create a new allocation mechanism, the backlog problem is untouched.

Second, there is a statutory authority question. Congress wrote EB-1 and EB-2 to reward merit: extraordinary ability demonstrated by acclaim, or national interest demonstrated by contributions to the U.S. economy, culture, or welfare. The Gold Card proclamation attempts to treat a financial gift as equivalent proof. Critics will argue this exceeds executive authority, because the statute never envisioned “money in lieu of merit.” Whether courts would accept that interpretation is an open question.

Finally, from a market standpoint, it’s not clear how attractive the Gold Card will be. For an Indian or Chinese national with wealth, an EB-5 set-aside petition at $800,000 in a rural or high-unemployment project may actually deliver faster results, with the added possibility of recouping capital. For large corporations, if an employee is important enough to justify a $2 million corporate gift, that individual may already qualify for EB-1A on their own achievements — making a standard petition, with legal and filing fees only a fraction of that cost, the more logical route. Unless the program is implemented in a way that truly circumvents source-of-funds checks, it’s hard to see how companies will use it — and if no source-of-funds review is required, the program risks being misused as a money-laundering tool.

In short, the Gold Card is fascinating as a policy experiment, but it raises more questions than answers: it promises predictability but not new numbers, it stretches statutory language, and its practical appeal to investors and employers remains uncertain.