Photo of Forrest G. Read IV

Forrest Read is a Principal in the Raleigh, North Carolina, office of Jackson Lewis P.C. He has extensive experience in both business immigration law and employment law and has particular focus in legal issues in graduate medical education (GME).

Mr. Read's immigration practice focuses on assisting employers in obtaining employment-based nonimmigrant visas (e.g., H-1B, L, O, TN) for foreign national employees and work-related immigrant (green card) visas, including PERM Labor Certifications, and advising employers on compliance with U.S. immigration laws and regulations. He has broad experience in advising large, mid-size and small employers on their various immigration needs and developing strategies to help them navigate through complex immigration issues. He also has particular experience in counseling employers in the health care industry and addressing immigration-related issues that arise for their broad range of health care professional employees (including advising on and obtaining employment authorization for medical residents and fellows and obtaining J-1 visa waivers for foreign national physicians completing their medical training in the United States). His immigration practice also includes defending employers in connection with Department of Labor H-1B and H-2B investigations.

Mr. Read’s employment law experience includes representing management, particularly academic medical centers in the GME context, in a wide array of workplace disputes and litigation before federal and state courts and administrative agencies, including matters related to discrimination, retaliation, harassment, disability, family and medical leave, various wage and hour issues, contracts, and intentional torts. He advises academic medical centers on the interplay between applicable academic law and employment law and the ramifications of what are divergent legal requirements and standards. Mr. Read also provides counsel with respect to the legal impact of competency standards for residents and trainees in GME, including situations involving discipline, remediation, and dismissal. He provides advice and guidance in the peer review process, including provision of verification and assessment of training in response to third party inquiries.

As a member of the Firm’s Corporate Diversity Counseling group, Mr. Read also has experience in providing assessments and making recommendations to corporate and institutional clients with respect to diversity and inclusion policies and initiatives, conducting related internal investigations, and shaping, developing and enforcing effective policies and initiatives to ensure consistency with client values and in furtherance of business goals and objectives.

President Donald Trump surprised the immigration community recently with an encouraging tweet about H-1B visa holders:

H-1B holders in the United States can rest assured that changes are soon coming which will bring both simplicity and certainty to your stay, including a potential path to citizenship.  We want to encourage talented and highly skilled

Although the number of petitions filed has decreased slightly over the past couple of years, the H-1B cap has been reached every year for the last six years. Due to the high demand, businesses must be ready to file their H-1B petitions on April 1, 2019. Thus, it is time to start strategizing and preparing

USCIS announced that, effective immediately, it is terminating yet another humanitarian parole program. This one is for individuals living in the Commonwealth of Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI). This move will affect, among others:

  • Immediate relatives of U.S. citizens;
  • Certain “stateless” individuals;
  • Immediate relatives of CNMI permanent residents; and
  • Certain in-home foreign worker caregivers of

In November 2018, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) notified the public of the opportunity to become a certified cargo screening canine!  Qualified explosives detection canine teams and their providers would be able to become registered Certified Cargo Screening Facility-Canines (CCSF-K9) in the TSA’s cargo screening program.

Until that time, only canines specially trained by TSA

A potentially significant bill eliminating the per-country caps on employment-based visas may become law.

H.R. 392, Fairness for High-Skilled Immigrants Act, first introduced in 2017, had 300 co-sponsors. It is now championed by outgoing Representative Kevin Yoder (R-Kan.) as an amendment to the spending package that Congress likely will pass this year.

The bill

The Department of Homeland Security’s latest Regulatory Agenda promises some big changes, especially for the H-1B visa program.

Many of these changes have been proposed before, but have not yet made it to the rulemaking stage.

Among what to expect are the following:

  1. USCIS is planning to release a notice of proposed rulemaking to

As Brexit negotiations are coming to a head, companies may need to take stock of the current situation and strategize about how to maintain employment of current EU national employees and how to prepare for the post-Brexit landscape.

Jackson Lewis is a founding member of L&E Global, a worldwide alliance of premier firms specializing in

California Federal Judge Edward M. Chen has issued a nationwide preliminary injunction in Ramos v. Nielsen, preventing the Administration from implementing its decisions to terminate Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for El Salvador, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Sudan, pending final resolution of the case.

This may be particularly good news for Sudanese TPS beneficiaries whose