America's elite lead boom of ‘golden' visa applications to vacation destination
"[There has been] a flood of formal interest in the new 'golden' visa," said New Zealand Immigration Minister Erica Stanford, according to Reuters.
In April, the government relaxed its visa rules to attract more high-net-worth individuals, with such changes as removing an English language requirement.
The country also reduced the amount of time required to spend in New Zealand.
Once the golden visa is obtained, it can be held for life. People do not need to reapply.
In under three months, 189 golden visa applications were received, while previous applications were at 116 submissions over the span of more than two-and-a-half years, Reuters reported.
Nearly half the applications were submitted by U.S. citizens, with Chinese citizens having the second-highest number of applications, the same source noted.
Former New Zealand Minister for Economic Development Stuart Nash, co-founder of Nash Kelly Global, told Fox News Digital the visas are getting more popular.
"There's a lot of global uncertainty at the moment," he said.
"You've got a war going on in Europe, you've got the tinderbox, which is the Middle East. You've got a change in the U.S. administration, which is causing more polarization than we've seen in a long, long time," said Nash.
"There are many Americans wanting to settle in New Zealand, as we're seen as this oasis at the bottom of the world," he added.
"You can live the New Zealand dream."
Nash pointed to New Zealand's "stable banking system" and lack of capital gains, wealth and death taxes.
"In this time of global uncertainty, geography is just as important as anything else. You jump on a plane and you're 1,200 miles away from trouble spots," said Nash.
He added, "In the past, people were looking for tax havens. Now they're looking for safe havens for them and their family."
Nash said the country's low population is a unique perk.
"We have wonderful scenery, sailing, golf — and we have some pretty cool people," Nash said.
He added, "You don't have to renounce your U.S. citizenship at all. You can get permanent residency for life and you can live the New Zealand dream."
Reuters contributed reporting to this article.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Fox News
2 hours ago
- Fox News
200 Marines head to Florida in support of ICE as military takes stronger stance on immigration
U.S. Northern Command (USNORTHCOM) is sending approximately 200 Marines to Florida in support of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) interior immigration enforcement mission. Marines attached to Marine Wing Support Squadron 272 and Marine Corps Air Station New River, North Carolina are responding as part of a request by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Secretary of Defense Sean Parnell requested backup in support of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Florida, Louisiana, and Texas with critical administrative and logistical capabilities at locations as directed by ICE. Parnell approved a mobilization of 700 in all to include active, National Guard and reserve forces. The Marines are in the first wave of USNORTHCOM's support. "Service members participating in this mission will perform strictly non-law enforcement duties within ICE facilities. Their roles will focus on administrative and logistical tasks, and they are specifically prohibited from direct contact with individuals in ICE custody or involvement in any aspect of the custody chain," according to a statement released by USNORTHCOM. Parnell stated in his statement that the support will relieve some of the unnecessary strain on law enforcement. "This support provides critical resources to support ICE's mission, freeing up law enforcement personnel to focus on law enforcement tasks and missions. The Department remains committed to securing 100% operational control of the border," the statement said. The U.S. Air Force and Navy have also taken over positions on federal land along the southern border, under a directive from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. The area, a roughly 250-mile stretch, located in Texas' Cameron and Hidalgo counties, is being transferred to Air Force control and will fall under the jurisdiction of Joint Base San Antonio. It will be managed as part of a newly established National Defense Area (NDA). In June, a battalion of 500 U.S. Marines mobilized to Los Angeles in response to anti-immigration enforcement riots, causing an outcry from liberal critics such as California Gov. Gavin Newsom, filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration. The governor's office both downplayed the troop movement and called it "completely uncalled for." The moves are part of a broader mission managed by the Joint Task Force – Southern Border (JTF-SB), a joint effort between the Air Force and U.S. Northern Command to consolidate and strengthen military presence along the border.
Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Yahoo
How Trump's bill will supercharge mass deportations by funneling $170bn to Ice
Thousands of new immigration enforcement officers. Tens of thousands of new detention beds. New fees on asylum applications. And new construction on the border wall. Donald Trump's sweeping spending bill would vastly expand the federal government's immigration enforcement machinery and, if passed by the House, supercharge the president's plan to carry out what he has vowed will be the largest deportation campaign in US history. The measure would authorize a level of immigration enforcement spending that analysts and advocates say is without precedent. Trump's so-called 'big, beautiful bill' dedicates roughly $170bn for immigration and border-related operations – a staggering sum that would make US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) the most heavily funded law enforcement agency in the federal government, and that critics warn will unleash more raids, disrupt the economy and severely restrict access to humanitarian protections like asylum. 'We've already seen aggressive, indiscriminate immigration enforcement across the country – and protests in reaction to how horribly it's been carried out,' said Daniel Costa, director of immigration law and policy research at the liberal Economic Policy Institute. 'And we're going to see such a massive increase that most people can't even begin to wrap their heads around it.' Related: What's in Trump's major tax bill? Extended cuts, deportations and more The 940-page bill passed the Senate on Tuesday, with JD Vance casting the tie-breaking vote. It now returns to the House, which approved an initial draft by a single vote in May. While some elements of the spending package could still change, the border security provisions in the House and Senate versions are largely aligned. And despite mounting public backlash over the Trump administration's sprawling immigration crackdown – which has separated families and even swept up US citizens – the proposal's 'unimaginable' immigration enforcement spending has received notably less scrutiny than its tax cuts and deep reductions to social safety net programs like Medicaid. 'It's going to fundamentally transform the immigration system,' said Adriel Orozco, senior policy counsel at the American Immigration Council (AIC). 'It's going to transform our society.' The Senate-passed bill would appropriate $45bn to build and operate new immigration detention centers – including facilities for families – marking a 265% increase over Ice's current detention budget and enabling the detention of at least 116,000 non-citizens daily, according to an analysis by theAIC. Experts say language in the bill could allow families to be detained indefinitely, in violation of the Flores settlement, the 1997 consent decree that limits the amount of time children can be detained by immigration officials. The measure would allocate $46.6bn for border wall construction – more than three times what was spent on the barrier during Trump's first term – and provide billions in grant funding to support and expand state and local cooperation with Ice. Though the legislation allots $3.3bn to the agency that oversees the country's immigration court system, it caps the number of immigration judges at 800, despite a huge backlog with millions of pending cases. It also imposes a series of new or elevated fees on immigration services. Asylum seekers – those fleeing persecution – would now be subject to a $100 application fee, plus an additional $100 for every year the application is pending. (The original House bill proposed a $1,000 fee.) Currently there is no fee, and experts warn that the added financial burden would in effect restrict asylum access to those who can afford it. The legislation would also levy new or heightened fees on work permits, nonimmigrant visas and temporary protected status applications, essentially imposing what Orozco calls a 'wealth test' on some of the world's most vulnerable people. An analysis by David Bier, associate director of immigration studies at the libertarian Cato Institute, argues that even without new funding, immigration enforcement spending was already 'extreme'. Congress had allocated nearly $34bn for immigration and border enforcement in fiscal year 2025 – more than double the combined budget for all other federal law enforcement agencies. That amount, according to the report, is about 36 times the IRS's budget for tax enforcement, 21 times the firearms enforcement budget, 13 times the drug enforcement budget and eight times more than the FBI's. As the bill heads to the House, it has drawn opposition from some fiscal conservatives, who are furious over projections that the Senate package would add $3.3tn to the national deficit over the next decade, the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) said in its estimate. In his analysis, based on the House's plan, Bier said CBO's projection fails to account for the lost tax revenue from millions of immigrants who would otherwise contribute more in taxes than they receive in public benefits. He forecasts that mass deportations enabled by the bill could add nearly $1tn to the deficit – roughly a quarter of the bill's total price tag. The White House insists the enforcement spending is worth it. Before Tuesday's Senate vote, Vance dismissed concerns about social safety net cuts and deficit projections, writing on X: 'The thing that will bankrupt this country more than any other policy is flooding the country with illegal immigration and then giving those migrants generous benefits.' He added that the president's policy package 'fixes this problem'. The proposed spending surge comes as the Trump administration moves aggressively to scale up arrests and deportations of undocumented immigrants. Despite promising a 'worst first' approach focused on violent offenders, Ice arrests of immigrants without any criminal history have soared since the start of Trump's term, a Guardian analysis of federal data found. The number spiked even more dramatically after a meeting in late May, during which Stephen Miller, White House deputy chief of staff and chief architect of Trump's hardline immigration policies, set a target of 3,000 arrests a day, or 1 million per year. 'Right now you have masked agents on the streets, collaborating with other federal law enforcement agencies and local law enforcement agencies, to try to meet these quotas for mass deportation,' Orozco said. 'We're just going to see that at a massively larger scale if this bill gets passed.' Following protests that erupted last month in Los Angeles against the administration's immigration sweeps, Trump has directed immigration officials to prioritize enforcement operations in Democratic-run cities. A new NPR/PBS News/Marist poll found that a majority of Americans – 54% – say they believe Ice operations have gone 'too far' while nearly six in 10 do not agree that the administration's deportation policies are making the country safer. 'There's virtually no support for this mass deportation effort outside of [Trump's] rabid Maga base,' said Matt Barreto, a Democratic pollster who studied Latinos and voter sentiment on immigration for decades. 'Other than that, people want immigrants to work here and to be here and to contribute to America.' Related: Trump's 'Alligator Alcatraz' tour was a calculated celebration of the dystopian As the Senate debated the bill on Tuesday, Trump was in Florida, touring the state's new migrant detention camp built in a remote area of the Everglades, known as 'Alligator Alcatraz'. 'This is a model,' Trump declared, 'but we need other states to step up.' Critics say there's little evidence to support the White House's contention that mass deportations will benefit the American workers. 'They're going to be deporting not just workers, but also consumers,' Costa said. 'That's a pretty big share of the workforce that you're going to be impacting.' An analysis published on Tuesday by his colleague at EPI, economist Ben Zipperer, estimates mass deportations would result in the loss of nearly 6m jobs over the next four years, both for immigrants and US-born workers. 'There is no upside to the mass deportations enabled by the Republican budget bill,' Zipperer wrote. 'They will cause immense harm to workers and families, shrink the economy, and weaken the labor market for everyone.'
Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Yahoo
Trump's tax-and-spending bill passes Congress in major win for president
The US House of Representatives passed Donald Trump's sweeping tax and spending bill on Thursday, handing the president the first major legislative victory of his second term and sending to his desk wide-ranging legislation expected to supercharge immigration enforcement and slash federal safety net programs. The 218-214 vote came after weeks of wrangling over the measure that Trump demanded be ready for his signature by Friday, the Independence Day holiday. Written by his Republican allies in Congress and unanimously rejected by Democrats, the bill traveled an uncertain road to passage that saw multiple all-night votes in the House and Senate and negotiations that lasted until the final hours before passage. Ultimately, Republicans who had objected to its cost and contents folded, and the bill passed with just two GOP defections: Thomas Massie, a rightwing Kentucky lawmaker, and Brian Fitzpatrick, who represents a Pennsylvania district that voted for Kamala Harris in last year's election. 'We've waited long enough, some of us have literally been up for days now, but this day – this day – is a hugely important one in the history of our nation,' the Republican House speaker, Mike Johnson, said, just before voting began. 'With one big, beautiful bill, we are going to make this country stronger, safer and more prosperous than ever before, and every American is going to benefit from that.' The legislation is expected to speed up and expand Immigration and Customs Enforcement deportations, and will probably make Trump's longstanding desire for a wall along the border with Mexico a reality. Related: How Trump's bill will supercharge mass deportations by funneling $170bn to Ice It also strikes a blow against the US government's efforts to fight the climate crisis by phasing out tax incentives created under Joe Biden that were intended to spur investments in electric cars, wind and solar power and other green energy technologies. The bill's centerpiece is a permanent extension of tax cuts made in 2017, during Trump's first term, as well as the creation of new, temporary exemptions for tips, overtime pay and car loan interest that the president promised voters during last year's campaign. The government will lose trillions of dollars in revenue from those provisions, and to offset their costs, Republicans approved an array of cuts to Medicaid, the federal program providing health insurance coverage to poor and disabled Americans, and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (Snap). Those changes are expected to cost millions of people their benefits, but the bill remains expensive, with the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) saying it will add $3.3tn to the country's debt through 2034. Massie explained his decision to vote against the bill in a post on X, writing that 'it will significantly increase U.S. budget deficits in the near term, negatively impacting all Americans through sustained inflation and high interest rates'. Fitzpatrick issued a statement saying 'it was the Senate's amendments to Medicaid, in addition to several other Senate provisions, that altered the analysis' for his district and made him vote no. Democrats blasted the proposal as 'one big, ugly bill' that dismantles anti-poverty programs to fund tax breaks for the wealthy. Analyses have shown that high earners benefited most from Trump's tax policies. The Democratic House minority leader, Hakeem Jeffries, made a last-ditch effort to halt the bill's passage by delivering a floor speech that lasted eight hours and 44 minutes, the longest ever. 'This is extraordinary. This assault on everyday Americans, assault on children, veterans, seniors, people with disabilities. It's incredible to me, all of this in this one, big, ugly bill,' Jeffries said. 'Ripping food out of the mouths of vulnerable Americans – that's extraordinary that that's what we're doing, extraordinary. And all of this is being done, this unprecedented assault on everyday Americans, is being unleashed on the American people, Mr Speaker, on the most vulnerable among us, all of this is being done to provide massive tax breaks to billionaire donors. Shame on this institution. If this bill passes, that's not America. We're better than this.' Trump has described the bill as crucial to the success of his second term, and congressional Republicans made its passage their top priority. It was a tall task – the GOP won small majorities in both the House and Senate in last November's election, and could afford no more than three defections in either chamber. The party's lawmakers broadly support Trump but were divided on a host of other issues. There were lawmakers who wanted big spending cuts, rapid phase-outs of green energy incentives and an expanded deduction that would mostly benefit taxpayers in Democratic-led states. Their demands butted against others who sought to moderate the bill, but over the course of weeks, Republicans leaders managed to forge a compromise. Trump appears to have also offered some concessions to hard-line holdouts from the Republican House freedom caucus at a meeting at the White House on Wednesday and in subsequent discussions, as his advisers rushed to ensure the bill passed without returning to the Senate. The details of Trump's concessions – possibly coming in the form of executive actions at a later date – were not immediately clear, and House freedom caucus chair Andy Harris declined to describe their discussions with Trump. 'When we looked at this entire package, the significant agreements we got with the administration in the last 24 hours made this package a much, much better package,' Harris told reporters after the vote. 'The agreement is with the president. If you want to know, ask the president.' The bill is only able to affect revenue, spending and the debt limit, under the rules of budget reconciliation that allowed the GOP to avoid a filibuster by Democrats in the Senate. Under Biden, Congress's then Democratic majority had used the same procedure to pass legislation to spur the economy's recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic and curb US carbon emissions. Related: What's in Trump's major tax bill? Extended cuts, deportations and more Trump's bill allocates $45bn for Ice detention facilities, $14bn for deportation operations and billions of dollars more to hire 10,000 new agents by 2029. An additional $50bn will go towards the border wall and other fortifications. Enrollees of Medicaid and Snap will face new work requirements, and states will be forced to share part of the cost of the latter program for the first time ever. The CBO estimates the bill's Medicaid changes could cost as many as 11.8 million people their healthcare, and the left-leaning Center on Budget and Policy Priorities forecasts about 8 million people, or one in five recipients, may lose their Snap benefits. The legislation also forces changes to provider taxes, which states use to finance their share of Medicaid spending. That is expected to further increase the financial stress of hospitals in rural areas, and when the bill was in the Senate, a $50bn fund was added to support those facilities. Some in the GOP were openly nervous about the cuts to safety net programs that their constituents rely on. Thom Tillis, a senator who represents swing state North Carolina, refused to support the bill for those reasons, leading Trump to announce he would support a primary challenger when he stands for re-election next year. Tillis then made public his plans to retire, a potential boost for Democrats' hopes of claiming his seat. 'It is inescapable this bill will betray the promise Donald Trump made,' Tillis said on the Senate floor. 'What do I tell 663,000 people in two years or three years when President Trump breaks his promise by pushing them off of Medicaid because the funding's not there any more, guys?'
