Dear Readers:

We’re pleased to present the inaugural issue of Visalaw Fashion, Arts and Sports (VFAS). We believe this is the first publication – online or offline – to cover this important subject and we hope to fill a significant information void.

People in creative and athletic fields face unique challenges in immigration law and they often deal with them in front of the media’s spotlight. Their cases are more likely to be subject to the discretion of an immigration examiner and the time pressures to get a visa or work authorization document are often extreme. International politics can frequently interfere with smooth processing of cases. In the case of athletes, they may be one injury away from the end of their green card prospects. And these are just a few of the issues we face in these cases.

Siskind Susser Bland has created an arts/sports/fashion practice group at our law firm, one of the first in the country. Our firm has one of the largest practices in this field representing a number of the world’s largest live entertainment, film, television, sports and fashion companies. We are drawing upon the expertise of lawyers in our New York , Memphis , Nashville , Las Vegas and Atlanta offices.

We also will regularly present articles from lawyers in our foreign affiliate offices to give readers exposure to how artists and athletes fare when migrating to other countries. We start this month with a discussion of Canada ’s rules.

This newsletter contains many elements that have worked for us in our other very successful publications (including our flagship Siskind’s Immigration Bulletin, the oldest Internet-based immigration publication today). We will present Ask Visalaw, News Bytes, News from the Courts and other features all with an arts, fashion and sports focus. We’ll also frequently post guest articles and commentary reprints such as the National Foundation for American Policy’s recent report on immigration and baseball and Yo Yo Ma’s congressional testimony on problem with arts visa processing. We also have a new feature called “Four Questions For…” where we will interview top immigrants and immigration professionals about their experiences with arts, sports and fashion immigration.

Finally, VFAS is to be the content anchor of a new section of Visalaw.com that will focus on arts, fashion and sports immigration. We are modeling this new section of our web site after our very successful health care immigration info center. We welcome your suggestions for links and sections in the new are of our site.

Finally, we realize that VFAS is a new publication and we may not be reading perfectly your interests in terms of what subjects we’re covering. Please give us your feedback so we can strive to produce a better and better publication. You are welcome to email me at gsiskind@visalaw.com. And if you are interested in hiring Siskind Susser Bland to be your law firm, please feel free to contact us at 901-682-6455 to set up a telephone or in person appointment.

Kind regards,

Greg Siskind