US looking to amend HIB programme: Lutnick

US commerce secretary Howard Lutnick on Tuesday announced that the Trump administration is looking at changes to the HIB visa program and Green Card system in a television interview.

- Shashank Mattoo

Terming the HIB visa system “terrible”, Lutnick stressed the need for reforms to America’s immigration policies.

“I'm involved in changing the HIB program. We're going to change that program because that is terrible. We're going to change the Green card. The average American makes $75,000 a year and the average Green Card recipient makes $66,000. So we're taking the bottom quartile. Like, why are we doing that? That's why Donald Trump is going to change it. That's the Gold Card that is coming in. We're going to start picking the best people to come into this country,” Lutnick said.

The Gold Card scheme is a proposed immigration scheme that would allow foreign citizens to purchase a path to US citizenship with a price tag of $5 million.