Trump promised the Gold Card would raise $100 billion and attract the world’s best, now hundreds are queuing, and one person has been approved

Despite months of publicity and hundreds of applicants already in line, the Trump administration’s Gold Card visa program has approved exactly one person since its application website launched in December. The $1 million premium residency program was designed to fast-track high-net-worth individuals into the United States, but its rollout has been anything but fast. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick recently acknowledged the pace, telling reporters, “This is a new program, and they’ve just set it up, and they wanted to make sure they did it perfectly.”

As highlighted by LADbible, the vetting process, Lutnick emphasized, is intensive. “It’s a DHS program done with a rigorous, rigorous vetting,” he said. The Department of Homeland Security is handling adjudications, and once an applicant pays a nonrefundable $15,000 processing fee, their petition is supposed to move on an expedited basis, provided all documents and additional fees are submitted on time. The $1 million payment itself is treated as evidence that the applicant will provide a major benefit to the United States.

For corporate sponsors, the cost rises to $2 million per employee. Applications are filed through a digital portal using Form I-140G, which cannot be submitted by mail. The program is specifically targeting what the administration describes as extraordinary individuals, with officials stating they intend to stop accepting applicants from the bottom quartile and focus only on those at the very top.

The $100 billion pitch has a long way to go

When the Gold Card was first announced, Lutnick suggested the program could generate as much as $100 billion for the federal government, with proceeds potentially used to reduce the national debt, amid broader anxieties about economic stability, including a UAE threat to price oil in Chinese yuan that has rattled financial observers this week. The national debt currently sits at roughly $37.5 trillion, making the Gold Card’s contribution a modest one at best. When asked how the funds would be used, Lutnick said only that it would be “determined by the administration, and its terms are for the betterment of the United States of America.”

At launch, the program expected to issue around 80,000 cards. This new tier is designed to replace existing employment-based visa categories, specifically the EB-1 and EB-2, for applicants of exceptional value. For those who find the Gold Card too modest, a platinum version is already in discussion, priced at $5 million and offering up to 270 days in the United States without taxation on non-US income.

The Gold Card is not the only change reshaping legal immigration pathways. The administration has also proposed raising the annual fee for H-1B visa applications to $100,000, a move that has alarmed universities, hospitals, and major tech companies including Microsoft, Amazon, Google, and Apple. Some companies have already advised staff on these visas to avoid international travel until further guidance is issued. The proposal is drawing added scrutiny amid questions about DHS leadership conduct that have surfaced in recent days.

The official USCIS page for Form I-140G confirms that everything is handled through the online portal with no option to file by paper. Whether the program reaches its stated goal of 80,000 approved participants remains an open question, but as of now, it has cleared exactly one.