Wealthy clients spurn Trump Gold Card visa amid legal doubts

Trump’s Gold Card visa is running into the one audience it was meant to impress: wealthy people who can afford to be choosy. Immigration lawyers representing high-net-worth clients are steering them away, arguing that the program’s appeal is being undercut by legal uncertainty, execution risk and a process that still looks less stable than established investor pathways.

The Gold Card was pitched as a fast route to U.S. residency for $1 million, but the mechanics are already turning off cautious applicants. The official program site says each applicant must first pay a nonrefundable $15,000 Homeland Security processing fee. It also says a $1 million gift, after vetting, is evidence that the applicant will substantially benefit the United States, with expedited processing only after the fee is received and documents are submitted.

That sequence matters to the ultra-wealthy, who typically treat migration as a long-term family, tax and legal decision rather than a branding exercise. Lawyers say clients with the resources to move anywhere are not eager to attach themselves to a program still being litigated and still trying to prove it has durable legal footing. Bloomberg Law reported that attorneys see the Gold Card as favoring wealth over merit and raising legality concerns.

The skepticism is reinforced by the numbers. A Washington Post report on April 29 said only 165 people had paid the application fee. Later reporting cited a Department of Homeland Security filing saying the program had 338 applicants. For a policy designed to signal demand from the global elite, that is a thin showing.

The backlash has also moved into court. The American Association of University Professors and a group of immigrant researchers and professionals filed a federal lawsuit challenging the program, arguing that it unlawfully prioritizes wealthy applicants over scientists, researchers and engineers whom Congress intended to favor. That case heightens the sense that the Gold Card could change, stall or be curtailed before applicants ever see the residency benefits they were promised.

The contrast with EB-5 is telling. USCIS says Congress created the investor visa in 1990 to stimulate the economy through job creation and capital investment, and requires investors to create or preserve 10 permanent full-time jobs for qualified U.S. workers. Congress.gov says EB-5 includes standalone and regional center pathways, with the regional center program currently facing a September 30, 2026 deadline in law. That old structure is complicated, but it is known. The Gold Card is new, contested and still trying to convince the people it targets that it will survive long enough to matter.