Late-Night Comics Take Aim At Trump's New 'Gold Card' Visa Plan

Television's prominent comedians spent the airtime ridiculing former President Donald Trump's just launched visa program, labeled the "gold card," characterizing it as a blatant pay-for-access arrangement for the wealthy.

Colbert's Witty Take

Kicking off his broadcast, Stephen Colbert offered a mock Christmas song targeting the president. "He is compiling a list, reviewing it twice, before handing that list to the agents at ICE," he intoned. "Donald Trump ... destroys everything he touches."

Colbert's target was the new initiative that enables international citizens to acquire U.S. residence for an investment of one million dollars, with a "platinum" version for five million. A government website guarantees approval "faster than ever."

"One note for you to wealthy foreigners: prior to you fork over the cash, have you considered Canada?" Colbert remarked.

He noted that the card is also intended to "extract cash" from companies wanting to hire skilled workers, requiring significant fees. "That's a lot of fees, though if you sign up, you additionally get free accommodation at a hotel of your choosing – provided that it's the that one hotel," he added.

"The best screening the government has before done," remarked Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, "that $15,000 vetting to verify these applicants absolutely are eligible to be in America."

"That's important, you gotta prove you're qualified to be an American," Colbert responded. "The initial query: how many burgers would you eat for a free T-shirt?"

Jimmy Kimmel's Humorous Roast

On his late-night show, Jimmy Kimmel referred to the visa program the "U.S. Access Express Card."

"It's a card that will let wealthy international individuals to live here," he stated. "For a million bucks, you get official resident status, you get a road to citizenship, and a presidential pardon for one significant crime of your choice."

"Perhaps it's time to change that message on the Statue of Liberty – never mind your tired masses. Give us a million bucks, you're in!" he joked.

Kimmel teased the brevity of the form, noting it is "harder to start a Wordle account." He remarked that Trump "believes citizenship is something you can sell, like a steak."

"Indeed, the best people are the rich people," Kimmel quipped. "It's what Jesus always said! Read it in the Bible. He says it's simpler for a camel to go through the eye of a needle provided that you pay the needle a million dollars."

Seth Meyers on Affordability Struggles

Elsewhere, Seth Meyers turned to Trump's declining poll ratings amid financial anxiety. "The public gave Donald Trump a another term because they were angry about the economy," he noted.

Recently, in a bid to address affordability, Trump conducted a briefing in front of a display of grocery items, and behaved peculiarly to some cereal.

"What a nice job, I think I'm going to take a few of them with me to my place and have a lot of fun," Trump remarked. "Such as the Cheerios, I haven't seen Cheerios in a long time."

"He's so fucking weird," Meyers said. "Like, you're going to take them back to your cottage to have a lot of fun with them? What's the plan with those Cheerios?"

Meyers wrapped up by criticizing conservative media defenses of Trump's economic record. "Perhaps rather than complaining, you should give him a shiny trophy like what FIFA did," he laughed.