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