Craig Harris: How Foreign Investors Get Green Cards by Investing Millions in the Charter School Industry
Thanks to a provision in the tax law, called the EB-5 program, wealthy foreign investors can buy green cards by investing in charter schools.
Craig Harris, award-winning investigative reporter for the Arizona Republic, took a close look at this provision in the law that allows foreign citizens to buy visas in exchange for funding charter schools.
He visited schools in Arizona and other states.
This story was published in December.
CORNELIUS, N.C. – When Lakeside Charter Academy opened five years ago in this boating community outside Charlotte, it faced the same challenge that confronts many new charter schools.
It had governmental approval to operate and the tax dollars that come with it to pay for teacher salaries, supplies and other expenses. But it had no money to build a school or lease classrooms.
Like most of the 45 states with charter schools — taxpayer-funded campuses operated largely by private businesses — North Carolina provides no money to new operators for start-up or capital costs.
So Lakeside struck a devil’s bargain of sorts. It entered CONTINUE READING: Craig Harris: How Foreign Investors Get Green Cards by Investing Millions in the Charter School Industry | Diane Ravitch's blog
