McDermott Will & Schulte, a global law firm

Joan-Elisse represents clients in a wide variety of industries, including finance and banking, publishing, entertainment, broadcasting, pharmaceuticals, chemicals, manufacturing, technology, hospitality and energy. She works with entrepreneurs developing US businesses, and also works on behalf of US citizens and foreign nationals to obtain visas for other countries.

Joan-Elisse has written and lectured on business immigration topics for many different audiences. She has written articles on foreign hiring for Human Resource Executive Immigration Advisor and Management News, and was recently interviewed for Realtor magazine regarding EB5 foreign investments in real estate projects. Her article on employer sanctions and I-9 compliance was recently published in Bloomberg BNA – Workplace Immigration Report. She has been a featured speaker at human resources conferences and meetings sponsored by a number of clients. Joan-Elisse was a guest lecturer in 2012 and 2014 for Northwestern University School of Law’s Tax LLM Program for the International Estate Planning course. She was a featured panelist on diversity at the American Immigration Lawyers Association New York Chapter Winter Conference and participated as a roundtable speaker on practices and pitfalls of remote work for the American Immigration Lawyers Association.

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• Represented a group of teenage soccer players in U visa applications after witnessing the murder of their friend and teammate, ultimately obtaining US permanent resident status for them, as well as US citizenship for several
• Represented a nonprofit foundation with multiple visa applications for employees in key roles for the organization, including personnel on the business side of fundraising and administration, as well as zoologists and scientists
• Represented a researcher involved in groundbreaking scientific advancements in his outstanding ability permanent residence application, receiving approval of the application within five months; this timing was critical to enable the client to better access government grants
• Represented a large medical practice in obtaining an outstanding ability O-1 visa for the organization’s selected CEO to assume the US position within days of filing the petition
• Represented an entrepreneur in obtaining an E-2 nonimmigrant visa status to start a new business in the US in which he had made a major investment. Timing was critically important to allow the entrepreneur to enter the US to develop his new business after leaving prior employment in the US.
• Represented an international sports organization with obtaining US visa status for their CEO to enter the US to oversee preparations for an upcoming international event. Due to the CEO’s rigorous travel schedule, coordination of both approval of the visa petition and issuance of the visa at a US consular post was challenging, but achieved on time.
• Represented several US citizen families who typically reside abroad with applications for visas for their trusted domestic employees to work in the US during the families’ temporary US relocation
• Represented numerous US businesses during mergers and acquisitions to ensure that target companies were providing a documented workforce legally able to continue work in the US

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