EB5 Investors Magazine Volume 4 Issue 1 | Page 38

IMMIGR ATION AT TORNE YS Charles Foster Foster LLP Charles C. Foster is Chairman of Foster LLP, one of the largest global immigration law firms. He is also the honorary Consul General of the Kingdom of Thailand. He received his Bachelor’s Degree and his Juris Doctorate from the University of Texas.  Foster is the founding Chairman of the State Bar of Texas Immigration Robert Gaffney Law Offices of Robert P. Gaffney For more than 30 years, Robert Gaffney has been helping individual and corporate clients make the United States their home through family, investment and employment-based immigration. Gaffney has represented clients immigrating under the EB-5 program since the statute was enacted in the early 1990s. He now runs the Law Offices of 36 TOP 25 and Nationality Law Section, Board member and past national President of the American Immigration Lawyers Association and past Chairman of the American Bar Association Coordinating Committee on Immigration law. He served as the immigration policy advisor to President George W. Bush  in the 2000 and 2004 presidential campaigns, to President Barack Obama in the 2008 campaign, and to Jeb Bush in the 2016 campaign.  Foster has been very supportive of U.S.-Sino relations, hosting paramount leader Deng Xiaopeng at a rodeo near Houston in 1979 and later as Chairman of the Asia Society Texas Center, hosting a dinner for President Jiang Zemin of China and most recently hosting a dinner for Vice Premier Liu Yandong. He was featured in an award winning film Mao’s Last Dancer involving a critical moment in U.S.-Sino relations.    Foster was the first recipient of the Distinguished Friend of China Award in 2000. He received four Royal Decorations from His Majesty, King Bhumibol of Thailand and many awards, including the highest awards from the American Immigration Lawyers Foundation and the Houston Bar Association. He has been designated a “Texas Super Lawyer” since 2003 by Texas Monthly.  Foster has represented individual EB-5 investors since 1990 when the EB-5 investor program was signed by President George H.W. Bush and Regional Centers since 1992, including the establishment of the first Regional Centers in the southern part of the United States. He leads the EB-5 practice group at Foster LLP with seven lawyers focused on the representation of foreign investors and Regional Centers. Since the 2009 Recession, the EB-5 program has become a critical factor in financing significant real estate and other projects throughout the United States. Robert P. Gaffney in San Francisco. Gaffney attended the University of Michigan Center for Chinese Studies as a foreign-language fellow in the mid-1970s, with a research focus on the political culture of post-revolutionary China. He is fluent in Mandarin Chinese. Gaffney is a California State Bar Certified Specialist in Immigration and Nationality Law, distinguishing him as among the most experienced and knowledgeable immigration attorneys in California. His ability to apply an uncommon breadth of knowledge and experience across a broad range of immigration law issues makes Gaffney an invaluable asset in immigration cases, and an effective bridge for EB-5 investors looking to establish a new life in the United States. The attorneys of the Law Offices of Robert P. Gaffney are supported by highly-skilled, multi-faceted teams of assistants with native fluency in multiple dialects of the Chinese and other East Asian languages and an advanced under- standing of the legal, social, and cultural context of East Asian countries affecting clients’ businesses and families. The firm specializes in providing independent counsel to immigrant investor clients at all stages of the immigration process and has special expertise counseling EB-5 clients from transitional economies on complex source of funds issues. Gaffney is a regular contributor to legal publications, frequently speaking on EB-5 and other immigration-law topics to business and professional groups. He has served as a mentor to many lawyers new to the EB-5 field. Gaffney has earned an AV rating, the highest rating for an attorney’s integrity and skill given by Martindale-Hubbell, a trusted peer-reviewed authority for legal professionalism in the United States. A northern California native, Gaffney enjoys international travel, and participating in the wealth of cultural and outdoor activities available in the San Francisco Bay Area. EB5 INVESTORS MAGAZINE