What is the history of the EB-5 visa category?
The EB-5 visa category started in 1991. Regional Centers started in 1993. During the mid 1990-‘s several companies competed for investment capital from foreign investors for the EB-5 program. Most of the companies didn’t offer sound investment opportunities and did not raise the full one million dollar investment capital or hire the required number of employees. INS wanted to stop these abuses of the program, this involved law suits and the EB-5 program was effectively placed on hold between 1998 and 2002. In 2002, Congress passed a new law to protect the pre-1998 investors. Also, in a case commonly known as “Chang” in the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that INS may not apply their new rules retroactively. In August of 2003, INS began approving regional center petitions for the first time since 1998. It is now common knowledge that EB-5 immigration petitions based on sound investments in designated regional centers for the full one million dollars as prescribed by the rules, with t
