Editorial with Sujit Nair | Will Trump’s $5M ‘Gold Card’ Visa Plan Help Indians Get US Citizenship?

[00:00:01] Namaskar! Welcome to another episode of Editorial. The US president says that, you want to come to the United States, you want to live here, you want citizenship here? Okay, pay 45 crores, roughly 45 crores, he says 5 million, roughly translating to 45 crores and become the citizen.

[00:00:24] Let's talk about this, let's get right into the show. Very interestingly, nowadays, Trump and his colleagues, his cabinet keeps us more occupied than possibly our good Prime Minister, Mr. Narendra Modi and his cabinet and his government. So let's talk about Trump. Every day there is

[00:00:50] something new that happens with the Trump government, Trump administration. So that is why I said what I said. Okay, so let's talk about Trump's new launch. Trump says, you want to come and stay in America? No. You want to come and stay in America? Come pay money and stay. You see, if you remember a few days back,

[00:01:14] Trump had deported a lot of Indians, a lot of people across the globe, but let's talk about Indians. And they had deported them in chains. In a military aircraft, he was, he had deported them. It had come and landed in Punjab and these people were in chains. That is how he deported. Possibly he wanted

[00:01:37] the world to see it. He was actually making that an example. See, this is how we treat illegal immigrants. To some extent, what I said is, listen, I don't know humanitarian. I never considered Trump to be a great humanitarian leader anyways. But from a country's perspective, that is his country, he will decide how an illegal immigrant should be treated. So he treated those people that way.

[00:02:02] Technically, those people were criminals to have gone and illegally migrated to a country. So that is what I said then. And I continue to have the same view today. Trump did that. Now there was a lot of countries who went and said that. Are you okay? You are deporting, but why are you humiliating them like this? Now Trump comes out and says that you guys want, you guys want to come and stay in America, no? You want to stay in my country? You want to stay?

[00:02:30] You pay money, stay in my country, help my economy, grow my economy, invest in my economy and stay in my country. I launched something called as a gold card. Earlier on, they had green card and now they also have a gold card. Gold card means what? He says you invest five million dollars. Five million dollars would equal to 45 odd crores of Indian rupees. You invest five million dollars in US economy

[00:03:00] and come and stay. Come and stay in the United States, work in the United States, no problem. He says, listen, you know what? A lot of companies come to me, a lot of companies come to me and says, you know, sir, what to do? We want to hire this Indian student, Chinese student, Japanese students, number one, toppers of their university, Yale University, Stanford, you know, top universities,

[00:03:27] toppers. We want to hire them, but we are very scared of hiring because we don't know whether they will get the visa or not. We'll get, whether they will get their H1B visa in this case or not. So, once we hire them, if they don't get, then we are in trouble. So, we don't know what to do. So, he says, listen, this is a solution. Dono Taraf Khush. You want to hire a foreign student? No, you pay five million dollars on that foreign student's behalf. He will offer a gold card to that foreign student. Let that foreign student come and work for your company. No problem.

[00:03:58] And he is telling the foreign students or possibly the world, they go, things have become very easy now. Paisa hai? Rejau. Nahi hai? Can't help it. Hard luck. Now, the problem is that company, a company, when the company is hiring a foreign student, that foreign student comes,

[00:04:25] most often, the foreign student comes at an entry level, isn't it? You are, it's a campus interview, for instance. A campus interview, a campus recruit cannot be appointed as managing director, no? So, that campus recruit will be appointed at an entry level position. Entry level position, would a company give five million dollars just as a fee for the government so that that candidate gets a golden

[00:04:53] visa or whatever, golden card? Is it even real? Imagine if a company has to hire 100 entry level staff and 100 foreign students, they pay 500 million dollars for those foreign students. And how will they recover? And what kind of money is this? So, will that really happen? That is

[00:05:17] question number one. You see, question number two is when Trump says that, you see, I am going to launch a golden card. He is not the first person to do this, by the way. He is not the first person in America to do this. America had launched something called as EB-5 visa in 1990s. In fact, in 1990, they had launched an EB-5 visa. EB-5 visa was very simple. EB-5 visa is if you invest anything

[00:05:46] between 800,000 dollars to 1 million dollars. Anything between 8 lakh dollars to 10 lakh dollars, that is 800,001 million. If you invest anything between this amount, you could get a US visa. Now, it is not that randomly you invest 800,000 dollars for cities in the United States, in cities in the United States, which were in economic distress. So, cities which are not doing well economically or

[00:06:14] wanted economic, it was in economic distress. If you go and invest your 800,000 dollars in that particular city, then you would get a visa, EB-5 visa for 800,000 dollars. If you are going to more prosperous cities and investing in most prosperous cities, then you pay 1 million dollars and you get an EB-5 visa. So, that was it. So, the government said that, or the United States government said that,

[00:06:43] listen, you know what, you invest in our economy, you get some jobs for people and therefore, you can come and stay. That is not a problem. So, this was what an EB-5 visa is. Now, the problem now, why is the golden visa different to the EB-5 visa? Let me tell you that. Or the golden card different to the EB-5 visa. My apologies again. Golden card different to the EB-5 visa is because, you see, EB-5

[00:07:09] visa was 1 million. Golden card is 5 million. So, that's the first difference. Chalo, that is one thing. Obviously, it is Trump. So, you can expect all this kind of numbers. But what is also different is that when EB-5 visa was being offered, H-1B visa was also kind of given parallelly. So, what I mean by that is while rich people could pay 1 million dollars and get into United States,

[00:07:39] a person who is not so well off but who did extremely well in United States universities, possibly got into that university through scholarship programs, did exceedingly well in United States University, topped the college, topped the school, topped the university, that person would get a job through an H-1B visa. That person, he or she could look forward for that American dream as they call it

[00:08:04] and get a job in United States through the H-1B visa because the H-1B visa was not as strict as what it is in Trump's regime. So, you had an option. So, rich people, 1 million, EB-5 visa and others who still wanted to be in America had an opportunity through really working hard on their academics, getting good universities, getting into good universities and getting a job there. So,

[00:08:29] there was an option. Now, there is a problem. See, the problem is first and foremost is if you see, I tell you why H-1B visa is so important for Indians. You see, 72.3% people out of the 386,000 people H-1B visa in 2023 were Indians. This was in Biden administration. 72.3% people who got H-1B visa in

[00:08:57] 2023 out of the 386,000 H-1B visa that was distributed were Indians. So, now you understand how important H-1B visa is for Indians? That is one. Secondly, if you see in 2018 during Trump regime, they saw the maximum percentage of rejection of H-1B visa in 2018 during Trump regime. Then that was 24%.

[00:09:22] Now, on your screen is a denial rate of initial employment. That is employment after the your university degree which is your H-1B visa. 2017 13% Trump, 2018 24% Trump, 2019 21% Trump, 2020

[00:09:40] 20% Biden, 2022 2.2% Biden, 2023 3.5% Biden, 24 2.5% Biden. So, what you see very clearly is during the Trump administration, the rejection, the denial was higher. And in Biden administration, not that I am

[00:10:06] comparing and all that, that is not my intention, but in Biden administration, the rejection was lesser. So, which means in Biden administration, you have two options, an EB-5 visa and H-1B visa. But in Trump's administration, the concept of H-1B visa is going to shrink, shrink more and more. For instance, I'll give you some more data. See, there are some key changes now already. Okay, first is the

[00:10:32] registration fees. The registration fees has been increased from $10 to $215. Okay, that is okay. Like I said, with Trump, you got to be ready for all this. So, that is one. Application fee has jumped from $460 to $780. That is one. Additional asylum fee has been added. Asylum fee, you have to pay an asylum fee of $600. That has also been added as a surcharge to your H-1B visa. So, this is one thing

[00:11:00] that has added. In total, companies now faces approximately $34,000 in legal and governmental fees for each initial or extended H-1B visa petition. Initial or extended visa petition, $34,000 a company has to pay. Now, you think how much a company would want that person or would the, how much that company

[00:11:28] would want to, a company would want to hire a foreign student by paying $34,000 extra. Now, under H-1B regime and what Trump is saying, $34,000, you pay $5 million and you hire your foreign student. This is what the broad understanding of this is and this is what is, how it is going to impact India.

[00:11:55] Like I said, 72.3%, my apologies, 72.3% of the $386,000 H-1B visa granted in 2023 were Indians. Now, let me also tell you in the same breath. From an American perspective, Trump is not all that wrong. What Trump is trying to do is, Trump is trying to ensure that his own people, that is the American

[00:12:25] citizens gets priorities in various companies. So, their students, their graduates, their postgraduates, their undergraduates gets the opportunity first and making it difficult for companies to hire foreign students. So, he is working for his country. Second thing, by charging $5 million,

[00:12:50] he says, okay, okay. If you want to come into America so badly, rich country, rich man's country pay money, help our economy so that with that money that is paid by foreign students and foreign immigrants and all that, we can help our locals. We can do more welfare for local people. We can create more jobs. We can create more job opportunities. We can boost our economy.

[00:13:18] So, that is what he in his mind has which to whatever extent, I think from his perspective, if you look at it, capitalist, yes, but benefiting his people. Okay. Now, before I end, you see, let me tell you, this is not just Trump's perspective that, you know, foreigners are getting more preferences, not Trump's perspective alone. A lot of people in United States think like this.

[00:13:43] There is a magistrate in US court, Justice Laurel Beeler. Justice Laurel Beeler said that, you know, you should file a suit against Meta because Meta prefers foreigners versus Americans. Now, why does Meta prefer foreigners? The judge says that Meta prefers foreigners because

[00:14:09] foreigners are cheaper and US labor is expensive. So, Meta is therefore giving opportunities to foreign workers than Indian, than American workers. What are our people going to do? And what are you trying to do? What are you trying to do? Just because we ensure a certain amount of lifestyle, we ensure a certain amount of minimum wages, you are hiring foreigners who are willing to

[00:14:35] work at lower than the minimum wages and then making more profits for yourself. You have no responsibility towards your country, your people. So, this thought is kind of there in United States. A lot of people feel the way Trump does them, but then Trump, you know, the advantage of Trump or the the genius of Trump is whatever you call it, genius or whatever. The genius of Trump is he can put

[00:15:05] every problem into a rate card. So, he can put a price tag to every problem. So, migration problem he has put a 5 million price tag and he solved it. You have the money, put 5 million, come. You don't have the money, stay home. This I think is the unique ability of Trump and yeah, I mean to some extent you

[00:15:30] should, one should appreciate it too. So, this is the point that I wanted to make today till I see you tomorrow at 10 pm. Namaskar.