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Trump is super proud of his dumb golden Trump Card scheme [1]

['Daily Kos Staff']

Date: 2025-06-13

President Donald Trump’s $5 million visa website dropped a couple of days ago, with sign-ups opening for wealthy foreigners to buy their way into permanent U.S. residency. And according to Trump, America may become “$75 Billion Dollars” richer—if you trust his sketchy math.

You’re forgiven for wondering how a website that looks like a landing page for a credit card with predatory interest rates will soon generate 11 digits worth of cash. Well, because according to Trump, there were 15,000 email sign-ups in the first 24 hours, and if every single one of them both is a real person (unlikely) and will pay the gold card’s $5 million price tag (unlikelier), then multiply 15,000 by $5 million and you get $75 billion. Voila! Sure, the Trump-backed tax bill winding through Congress will increase our deficit by $2.4 trillion over the next decade, but to balance the budget, you gotta start somewhere, right?

And where we’re starting is the tackiest card ever. Look at that thing. Stern eagle! Stars! Statue of Liberty! Steely-eyed Trump! Trump’s scribbled signature! It’s ghastly. But to Trump, this is absolutely his shit. The White House is now full of tacky gold. Gold painted, gold plated, all of it. How about some gold “TRUMP” drink coasters? A totally cool and normal thing for a president to have.

The Trump Card. Yes, really.

Also cool and normal? To name the ostensibly official new way to emigrate to America after yourself. Yes folks, it’s not the gold card. It’s the Trump Card. The website is even TrumpCard.gov—“an official website of the United States government,” says the site’s banner. Ugh.

The threadbare nature of this scheme highlights how this is just a way to grease Trump’s palms to speed your entry into the country. Per Trump, your $5 million doesn’t get you citizenship. It gets you a path toward it, instead. Is there any information about what that path looks like? Heavens, no. Any timeline? Heavens, no.

It’s patent nonsense for Trump to insinuate the government has made any money yet. Normally, at this early stage, one might assume the government is out some money as they build the infrastructure to launch the new program. However, since the infrastructure so far seems to be little more than the sort of website you can build in an hour with Squarespace, they’re probably not out a ton of cash.

Trump knows full well that 15,000 sign-ups do not mean 15,000 people will choose to apply, have $5 million, and be approved. To sign up on the website, people don’t need to provide proof of their financial situation, nor is any vetting occurring. These people are just randos on a list.

But here’s where the master becomes the student.

A Tesla robot is displayed as U.S. robotics companies look for congressional support to compete with Chinese companies, in Washington, on March 26.

While Trump has always been a pitchman—big, brash, tacky, flexible with the truth—his vibe is more personal, bragging about his skills. Compared that with former co-President Elon Musk, a master of the hype cycle, where you tell everyone that people are clamoring for your product, which leads to investors clamoring to give you money. By the time realization and disappointment set in, their money is long gone.

Musk once boasted that there were 1 million sign-ups to buy his dumpster-shaped Tesla Cybertruck, a product that has sold less than 50,000 units in total as of late March. Or take Musk’s recent promise that Tesla would make 5,000 Optimus humanoid robots this year. No, wait—by next year, “probably 50,000-ish” robots, he said. No, scratch that: “10 times bigger than the next biggest product ever made,” he said. After musing that Tesla might eventually make tens of millions robots per year, he settled on “maybe 100 million robots a year.”

Feels like even if that were true, supply would outstrip demand pretty quickly. At 100 million robots a year, it would take about three and a half years of production for there to be more Optimus robots than people in the U.S.

Back to Trump: It’s not just that his gold visa card is tacky or that it is all but sure to fall short of the revenue Trump has promised. It’s also that it’s a literal invitation to give a vast sum of money to the government via a card named for the current president, one who already has a culture of personality surrounding him. By keeping the requirements vague, the vibe personal, and the potential for success in getting citizenship unknown, it turns what should be a government program with layers of neutral administration into a personal appeal to Trump—with lots of cash, natch—to let you in the country.

Definitely going to attract all the right people.

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2025/6/13/2327745/-Trump-is-super-proud-of-his-dumb-golden-Trump-Card-scheme?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=top_news_slot_9&pm_medium=web

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