The House is scheduled to vote on the $1.1 trillion omnibus spending bill, the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2016, on Friday, Dec. 18. In his Thursday statement on the Senate floor, Senator Grassley, who is chairman of the Judiciary Committee, said, “At 1:30AM Wednesday morning, an omnibus appropriations bill was filed to keep the government operating for the remainder of the fiscal year. This bill, which will be voted on by the House on Friday, includes a straight and clean extension of a program called the EB-5 Immigrant Investor program.”
“This program has been plagued by fraud and abuse,” said the senator. “But more importantly, it poses significant national security risks. Allegations suggesting the EB-5 program may be facilitating terrorist travel, economic espionage, money laundering and investment fraud are too serious to ignore.” “Yet, the omnibus bill fails to include much needed reforms,” he said. “The spending bill being considered by the House and Senate is a major disappointment. I’m frustrated that, despite the alarm bells and whistleblowers warning us about the program, Republican and Democrat leadership in the House and Senate decided to simply extend the program without any changes. This was a missed opportunity.”
In the EB-5 Immigrant Investor Program, foreigners (and their spouses and unmarried children) are able to apply for a green card (permanent residence) in the United States if they invest at least $1 million in an American business or at least $500,000 in a U.S. business that is in a high unemployment or rural area, what is called a Targeted Employment Area, according to the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Senator Grassley further said, “It is widely acknowledged that the EB-5 program is riddled with flaws and corruption. … The Government Accountability Office, the media, industry experts, members of congress, and federal agency officials, have concurred that the program is a serious problem with serious vulnerabilities.”
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