Trump plans $5 million ‘gold card’ visa for US citizenship, replacing EB-5 investor visas
Washington (PTI): President Donald Trump said that he plans to offer a “gold card” visa with a path to citizenship for USD5 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 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 USD1 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.
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.
Trump made no mention of the requirements for job creation. And, while the number of EB-5 visas is capped, Trump 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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Deaf and mute woman breaks 16-year silence, exposes serial sexual abuse, blackmail in Mumbai
Mumbai (PTI): A deaf and mute woman's complaint about a sexual assault that took place 16 years ago in Mumbai has unmasked a serial predator, revealing a disturbing pattern of abuse and blackmail he perpetrated on several women from the community.
The accused was arrested on December 13 after the survivor broke her silence recently following the suicide attempt by one of the women he allegedly sexually harassed.
Disturbed by the suicide attempt, she confided in her friends during a video call about the assault that occurred in 2009.
According to the police, the survivor, a resident of the western suburbs, communicated in sign language during a video call with her friends and colleagues, who were part of a WhatsApp group, that the accused had drugged and raped her when she was a minor.
She also took her husband into confidence, and with support from Thane Deaf Association president Vaibhav Ghaisis, activist Mohammed Farhan Khan, sign language interpreter Madhu Keni, and a retired officer from the Ali Yavar Jung National Institute of Speech and Hearing Disabilities Divyangjan, the survivor approached the police.
The survivor, her husband and a few of her friends went to the Kurar police station, where her statement was recorded in camera, with Keni as interpreter, and the accused, Mahesh Pawar, was arrested a few hours later from Virar, a suburb in Palghar district.
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Recalling the trauma she endured 16 years ago, the survivor said that a female friend had invited her to explore the city in July 2009 and took her to Pawar's home in Vakola, Santacruz, an official said.
The accused allegedly offered her samosas and some beverage to celebrate the female friend's birthday. The survivor said she was forced to have the drink, which Pawar had allegedly spiked, and after a while, her friend left her alone with him.
The accused allegedly overpowered and raped her, and later blackmailed her with the recorded video of the assault.
The trauma of assault stayed with her over the years, and the attempted suicide of another woman from the community, allegedly assaulted by Pawar, propelled her to come forward.
A probe has revealed that the accused had similarly drugged and assaulted speech and hearing impaired women and threatened them into silence by blackmailing them with obscene videos, a senior police officer said.
The accused allegedly shot obscene videos of several women, using which he blackmailed them and extorted money, gold and mobile phones, he said.
He allegedly forced women into participating in nude video calls with him and recorded these to threaten them, the official said.
"As per initial investigation so far, we have evidence of his abuse of seven women, but the number can increase to more than 24," the official told PTI.
While Pawar has been remanded in judicial custody, no other woman has come forward with a complaint against him as yet, he said.
Talking to PTI, Keni said all women who have survived abuse and harassment by Pawar want to lodge a complaint against him.
She claimed that the accused had extorted money from one of the women he abused, but did not return the sum even when she needed it for a medical emergency.
