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Trump Wants to Issue Green Cards to Foreign Students Who Graduate College

The proposal drew criticism from Rep. Thomas Massie, Laura Loomer and Steve Bannon

Published: June 21, 2024
  |   By Chris Karr
Trump Wants to Issue Green Cards to Foreign Students Who Graduate College

Former President Donald Trump announced that any foreign student who graduates from a college in the U.S. should automatically receive a green card.


Trump made the comment during a Thursday appearance on the All-In podcast with Chamath Palihapitiya, Jason Calacanis, David Sacks and David Friedberg.

The former president explained his view while responding to Calacanis, who stressed the country’s need to recruit high-skilled workers.

“Can you please promise us you will give us more ability to import the best and brightest around the world to America?” the co-host asked.

“I do promise,” Trump said. “Let me just tell you that it’s so sad when we lose people from Harvard, MIT, from the greatest schools, and lesser schools that are phenomenal schools, also.”

“What I wanna do, and what I will do, is you graduate from a college, I think you should get automatically, as a part of your diploma, a green card to be able to stay in this country,” he said. “And that includes junior colleges, too. Anybody graduates from a college – you go in there for two years or four years – if you graduate or you get a doctorate degree from a college, you should be able to stay in this country.”

Trump prefaced his position by saying he wanted to implement this policy during his first term, “but then we had to solve the COVID problem because that came in and sort of dominated for a little while, as you perhaps know.”

“I know of stories where people graduated from a top college, or from a college, and they desperately wanted to stay here, they had a plan for a company, a concept, and they can’t," he continued. "They go back to India, they go back to China, they do the same basic company in those places, and they become multi-billionaires, employing thousands and thousands of people – and it could have been done here.”


He cited the “bigger example” of companies requiring a pool of “smart people” to employee.

“You need brilliant people, and we force the brilliant people – the people that graduate from college, the people that are number one in their class from the best colleges – you have to be able to recruit these people and keep the people,” Trump added.

“It was such a big deal. Somebody graduates at the top of the class, they can’t even make a deal with a company because they don’t think they’re gonna be able to stay in the country,” he said. “That is gonna end on Day One.”

Trump’s proposal drew criticism from several prominent figures, including Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.).

“A two year degree in political science should NOT grant you legal U.S. residency,” he wrote on X. “I’m for legal immigration. We should welcome skilled people who can strengthen our republic & who subscribe to the values enshrined in our Constitution. But this ain’t it!”


Political commentator John Cardillo responded to the announcement by calling Trump a far-left Democrat, adding “We are so f-----.”

“If you aren't slamming Trump for his diploma green card amnesty plan, not only aren't you conservative, you're not even a populist because no one with a working brain cell thinks this is a good idea,” he wrote on X.

Journalist and activist Laura Loomer, a staunch Trump loyalist, also disagreed with his position.

“Giving green cards to college graduates from foreign nations is a policy that the base opposes,” she wrote. “How can we trust that any vetting of the foreigners on campus would be done adequately when vetting in other areas like personnel has failed?”

She then called for no more visas until homeless veterans were off the street, the middle class is restored, and all illegal aliens are deported.


Trump’s former chief strategist Steve Bannon contended with the policy proposal on a Friday morning episode of War Room.

“Reasonable people can disagree on even basic policies like this," he said. "And this is why I think we have to start talking about America First, but we have to get into this conversation: American citizens first.”

Bannon suggested dramatically limiting the number of foreign students in the U.S. in favor of Americans, including African Americans and Hispanics. He said this would kickstart “a change in spirit in this nation right away.”

“You’re an American citizen. You get a special deal – above anybody else in the world. You. Because this is the United States of America,” he said.

Bannon went on to propose adding an exit visa to the diploma of foreign graduates – “we support them every way we possibly can as they go back to their home country and make their country great again. … This is how you have true alliances … those bonds of affinity.”


The Hill noted that Trump’s comments appear to mirror a policy by Hillary Clinton during her 2016 bid for the White House.

A fact sheet from her campaign website stated: “As part of a comprehensive immigration solution, Hillary would ‘staple’ a green card to STEM masters and PhDs from accredited institutions—enabling international students who complete degrees in these fields to move to green card status.”

In a statement to The Hill, Biden-Harris campaign spokesman Kevin Munoz claimed that when Trump was president, he made it his “mission to rip apart immigrant families for his own political gain."

“Trump’s empty promise is both a lie and an insult, especially to the countless people that have been permanently damaged by his first-term in office,” Munoz added.

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