The US Small Business Administration (SBA) has announced a major policy shift that will bar businesses with legal permanent residents (green card holders) from accessing SBA-backed loans, drawing sharp criticism from Democratic lawmakers.<\/p>\n
In a policy notice published on February 2, the SBA said the changes will take effect from March 1, 2026.<\/p>\n
100% US citizen ownership now mandatory<\/p>\n
Under the revised Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) 50 10 8, the SBA will require that 100% of all direct and indirect owners of a small business applicant be US citizens or US nationals who maintain their principal residence in the United States, its territories, or possessions.<\/p>\n
The update is aligned with 13 C.F.R. 120.100 and Executive Order 14159, titled \u201cProtecting the American People Against Invasion.\u201d<\/p>\n
Green Card holders barred from any ownership in loan applicants<\/p>\n
The new policy explicitly makes legal permanent residents (LPRs) ineligible to hold any ownership stake\u2014direct or indirect\u2014in an SBA loan applicant, operating company (OC), or eligible passive company (EPC).<\/p>\n
This marks a significant tightening from earlier rules.<\/p>\n
Earlier 5% foreign ownership exception scrapped<\/p>\n
The notice rescinds SBA Procedural Notice 5000-872050, which had allowed up to 5% ownership by foreign nationals or by US citizens, nationals, or LPRs residing outside the US.<\/p>\n
That narrow exception will no longer apply from March 1.<\/p>\n
Democrats slam SBA move<\/p>\n
Senator Edward J. Markey of Massachusetts and Representative Nydia Vel\u00e1zquez of New York, the ranking members of the Senate and House Small Business Committees, condemned the decision.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Trump administration is stoking the flames of hatred, spreading fear and confusion among immigrants and small business owners. Rather than support hard-working legal immigrants to start or expand a business, the Trump SBA is choosing hatred by barring green card holders from receiving an SBA loan. The Administration\u2019s message to immigrants is clear: you are not welcome to pursue the American Dream,\u201d they said, accusing the SBA of undermining legal immigrants pursuing entrepreneurship.<\/p>\n
Concerns raised earlier ignored: Lawmakers<\/p>\n
Lawmakers noted that concerns over stricter citizenship verification rules had been raised repeatedly with the SBA.<\/p>\n
In July, Markey and Vel\u00e1zquez warned the agency about \u201cdraconian\u201d requirements. In September, lenders flagged operational issues, while in December, Democratic members of the Senate Small Business Committee pointed to a decline in SBA lending volumes.<\/p>\n
Despite multiple letters and lender feedback, the SBA has not formally responded, they said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The US Small Business Administration (SBA) has announced a major policy shift that will bar businesses with legal…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":563663,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[16],"tags":[245969,64,139471,607,245976,12287,245968,20521,245974,58434,245972,245975,245973,245967,245970,4352,67,132,68,245971],"class_list":["post-563662","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entrepreneurship","tag-100-us-citizen-ownership","tag-business","tag-edward-markey","tag-entrepreneurship","tag-foreign-ownership-restrictions","tag-immigration-policy","tag-legal-permanent-residents","tag-nydia-velazquez","tag-sba-loan-eligibility","tag-sba-loans","tag-sba-loans-green-card-holders-legal-permanent-residents","tag-sba-loans-us-citizenship-requirement","tag-sba-policy-change","tag-sba-backed-loans","tag-small-business-applicant","tag-trump-administration","tag-united-states","tag-unitedstates","tag-us","tag-us-small-business-administration"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":"Validation failed: Text character limit of 500 exceeded"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/563662","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=563662"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/563662\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/563663"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=563662"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=563662"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=563662"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}