Elon Musk’s DOGE Team Building System to Sell ‘Gold Card’ Immigrant Visas

Members of Elon Musk’s government-slashing task force are building a system for the United States to sell special immigration visas, which President Trump has labeled “gold cards,” for $5 million apiece.

Engineers associated with Mr. Musk’s team have been working with employees from the State Department, the Department of Homeland Security and United States Citizenship and Immigration Services to create a website and application process for the visas, according to three people familiar with the discussions and documents seen by The New York Times.

The project represents something of a shift in mission for Mr. Musk’s team, the Department of Government Efficiency, from its initial task of cutting government costs toward a new goal of generating revenue.

In late February, Mr. Trump announced his idea for a gold card to give “very high-level people” a “route to citizenship.”

The president and his commerce secretary, Howard Lutnick, provided few details at the time about who would qualify for the program but noted that it would replace the EB-5 visa, which grants permanent residence to foreign nationals willing to invest in U.S. businesses. That program provided green cards to individuals who invested either $800,000 or $1.05 million, creating at least 10 jobs for American workers. It raised about $4 billion for the federal government last year.

The gold card project is being led from the DOGE side by Marko Elez and Edward Coristine, who have been working on it since at least last month. Mr. Elez and Mr. Coristine have met with officials at various agencies that oversee facets of the visa and immigrant vetting process to understand which existing processes can be incorporated into their new system.