A Targeted Employment Area is a region of the United States for which the threshold for investment for an investor to be eligible for the EB-5 visa is $900,000. There are two kinds of TEAs: high unemployment areas and rural areas.
Definition
There are two kinds of TEAs recognized by the USCIS: rural areas and high unemployment areas.
Rural areas
An area can be designated as a TEA if, at the time of application, it is a rural area. This is defined as an area that is not within either a metropolitan statistical area or the outer boundary of any city or town having a population of 20,000 or more.
High unemployment areas
An area can be designated as a TEA based on high unemployment if it has experienced unemployment of at least 150% of the national average rate as determined by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. In 2018, this average was 3.9%, so currently, to qualify as a TEA based on high unemployment an area must have an unemployment rate of at least 5.9%.
TEA determination
If the location of the proposed new business is not already determined to be a TEA, the investor has the option to gather the relevant publicly available state or federal statistics on their own and submit it with their petition for USCIS to have a new TEA determination made. There is no centralized list of targeted employment areas, but state agencies in various states maintain their own lists or criteria for identifying TEAs, as well as information on local unemployment rates that can be cited in applications. Various US states facilitate the process by allowing people to apply for certification for particular areas being designated as TEAs. USCIS defers to state determinations but periodically reviews the criteria used by states to confirm that they comply with its guidelines. In addition, there are privately collected information sources on unemployment by census tract, including interactive maps, that can help investors identify TEAs.
The state of Minnesota commissioned a study by the Carlson Consulting Enterprise to better understand how the state could leverage the EB-5 investor program to drive employment growth in the state, particularly in high-unemployment areas. The program has also been highlighted as a way to improve employment for black residents on North Minneapolis by matching them with EB-5 investors from Asia.
Reception
A 2011 article in the New York Times claimed that areas within New York had been strangely gerrymandered so that relatively upscale and wealthy locations could qualify for TEA status, and also noted pushback from locals against an EB-5-funded program for a proposed China City program in upstate New York. Similarly, EB-5-funded construction projects by Marriott, including some in Washington D.C., have met with criticism for how they have sought TEA status for wealthy and well-off regions, contradicting the original spirit of the TEA designation. The Washington City Paper cited the American Immigration Lawyers Association on the ease of having your area designated as a TEA, writing: "The ease of qualifying for TEAs is such an open secret that the American Immigration Lawyers Association fact sheet on EB-5 states simply, "Each immigrant investor must create 10 US jobs with an investment of $500,000 or more"—rather than the $1 million required outside of TEAs." Similar skepticism about TEAs was expressed in an article in Fortune, that said: "One essential part of gaining USCIS approval was crafting an acceptable "targeted employment area," or TEA. The EB-5 law requires investment in a district that is either rural or has a jobless rate that is 150% of the national average. But after years of industry pressure, it's now USCIS policy to automatically accept any state designation of a TEA, even though states routinely approve gerrymandered districts that tack on distant high-unemployment tracts to allow EB-5 endeavors in wealthy areas."
