Speech #1100145880

President. I seek recognition to speak on the State Foreign Investment Improvement Act. which I am cosponsoring with Senator LEAHY. This bill will make permanent the Immigrant Investor Pilot Program. an innovative and successful program which has been in existence for 15 years. Under this program. State and local governments. and private entities. are able to apply to the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service for "regional center" status which enables them to attract the jobcreating dollars of immigrant investor visa holders. The immigrant investor visaknown as the EB5 visawas created in 1990 and grants lawful permanent residency to Individuals willing to invest at least $1 million in an enterprise that directly employs at least 10 legal workers in the United States. In certain rural or highunemployment areas. however. the dollar amount is reduced to at least $500.000. though the jobcreation requirements remain the same. In 1992. to stimulate interest in these immigrant investor visas. Congress created the Immigrant Investor Pilot Program. By investing in the designated "regional centers" instead of creating their own enterprises or partnerships. immigrant investors can meet the jobcreation requirements of their visas more easily. since they need only show the indirect creation of 10 jobs through a "regional center." Otherwise. an immigrant investor would have to show that his or her investment directly created the jobs. The Immigrant Investor Pilot Program has proven to be an attractive option for potential immigrant investors. being chosen by an estimated 75 percent to 80 percent of all immigrant investors since its inception. Indeed. in my home state of Pennsylvania. the two regional centersone in western Pennsylvania and one in Philadelphiahave generated millions of dollars in foreign investment. However. this program is set to expire at the end of the 2008 fiscal year. The Immigrant Investor Pilot Program has thus become a vital component of the immigrant investor visa. a category of visa whose benefits are difficult to overstate. The Government Accountability Office estimates that immigrant investors were responsible for over $1 billion in jobcreating investments between 1992 and mid2004. These investments have aided enterprises as diverse as the growth of dairy and meatpacking industries in South Dakota and improvements to the shipyard in Philadelphia. However. the most important contribution of the immigrant investor visa has been the creation of jobs within the United States. And in this aim. the immigrant investor visa has been very successful. creating jobs in the thousands. In addition to preserving the current successful status quo of the Immigrant Investor Pilot Program by making it permanent. this bill makes minor improvements to the immigrant investor visa application procedure. It establishes an application fee for entities seeking designation as a "regional center" under the Pilot Program. and it provides premium processing fees for immigrant investor applications. Both of these fees will enable the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service to devote more resources to adjudicating these applications rapidly. Finally. this bill allows for concurrent filing of the immigrant investor petition and application for adjustment to lawful permanent resident. thereby providing for a shorter processing time for "regional center" applicants. Last November. the Wall Street Journal stated that the immigrant investor visa is "pumping millions of dollars from foreign investors into dilapidated inner cities and employmentstarved rural areas across the U.S." At a time when Congress is weighing how it will address economic instability. it would be unwise to neglect such an economically beneficial program. Accordingly. I am pleased to cosponsor this piece of legislation with Senator LEAHY and I urge my colleagues to support it.