We at the Center for Immigration Studies write frequently about the EB-5 (immigrant investor) program, and apparently that's why we recently received this (partially redacted) blast e-mail:
Dear Attorney Group.
[redacted name of Brooklyn wholesale grocer] is willing to sponsor EB5 clients. As such we are looking for passive overseas financial investors for our 19 year old establishment.
I can be contacted at [redacted].
It probably was sent to us in error, but it set us to thinking.
We do not know if our new friend in Brooklyn knows that USCIS requires the creation of ten new jobs with each $500,000 EB-5 investment, or that the agency thinks about the program as a way of expanding business activities in the U.S.
But the wholesale grocer has hit the nail on the head in terms of the actual operations of the EB-5 program; it uses the most passive of alien investors, and it is usually involved in non-cutting edge activities like a 19-year-old wholesale grocery firm in Brooklyn; which sounds like a stable business in a stable place.
I wonder, did he get any nibbles from his missive? He did not reply to our questions about it.