Victory in Canadian Exception Lawsuit: Atanackovic v. Duke

Brian Schmitt writes:

"Plaintiffs sought review of a CBP decision to deny a Canadian physician’s denial of admission into the United States in H-1B visa status.  The physician was denied admission because he was subject to the two-year foreign residence requirement of INA § 212(e).

The court found that CBP’s refusal to admit the Canadian national physician was an abuse of discretion and not in accordance with the law.

Brian Schmitt served as lead counsel on the lawsuit.  Danielle Rizzo served as the CBP cross border subject matter expert on the case.  Russell Roberts handled the administrative mitigation of the immediate fallout from the denial of admission.  Greg Siskind and Bill Stock supplied expert declarations in support of the litigation.

At long last, the Court finally issued the decision in the Canadian Exception case concerning Buffalo POE.  Decision is linked here.  See pgs. 20-23.

The court found that CBP’s refusal to admit the Canadian national physician was an abuse of discretion and not in accordance with the law.

Hat tip to Danielle Rizzo as the CBP cross border subject matter expert on this case.  This would not have been possible without her incisive legal analysis.  In my opinion, she is one of the best, if not the best, cross-border lawyers in the country.

Hat tip to Russell Roberts for his work on the case as well.  He expertly handled mitigation of the immediate fallout from the denial of admission.  He also marshalled the support of the corporate clients.  He further assisted by having his firm’s litigation department assist in our understanding of local practice in the Western District of New York.

Further hat tip to Greg Siskind and Bill Stock.  Both lawyers supplied expert declarations in support of the case.  The government strenuously objected to the admission of these expert declarations and they lost.  These declarations were critical to the success of the litigation.  We argued that Greg was an expert based on his authorship of various books including the J Visa Guidebook.  Bill Stock wrote from his position as an immediate past president of AILA."