Knight Ridder Newspapers

CHARLOTTE, N.C. – International soccer star David Beckham and wife Victoria, formerly Posh Spice of the Spice Girls, don’t wait months or years to enter the United States legally.

Beckham’s status, bankroll and his attorney see to that. He receives approval for his visa within two weeks. Accommodating U.S. State Department officials grant him after-hours appointments and have asked him to pose for photos.

As an “alien of extraordinary ability,” Beckham is eligible for an O-1 work visa reserved for elite figures in sports, science, arts, education and business.

These and companion visas for family and support personnel have no caps on the number who can arrive. Their numbers have more than doubled over the last decade.

Meanwhile, specialty workers with four-year degrees can’t always bend the bureaucracy like Beckham. Demand for visas from these workers, with professions such as computer programming, engineering and accounting, has surged. But the cap, briefly raised a few years ago, remains at 65,000 – what it was in 1992. The 2007 cap was filled May 26, a record four months before the fiscal year begins.

Currently, Congress is debating whether to increase these visas to help relieve the backlog, as well as granting legal status to some of the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants, including about 445,000 in the Carolinas.

Immigration “law is really geared toward helping the rich and famous,” says David Whitlock, a partner who heads immigration practice at law firm Fisher & Phillips in Atlanta.

As for the hospitable inscription on the Statue of Liberty, “Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free … ,” Whitlock says, “We shut that down and turned it into a national park.”

Most industrialized countries have an immigrant pecking order, notes Alan Gordon, a Charlotte immigration lawyer who recently helped a Canadian racing phenom enter the country.

“How did Johnny Depp get to live in France? Did he go through a lottery system?” asks Gordon. “No. It’s because he’s spending money.”

Indeed, countries have always welcomed the elite.

“And maybe rightly so,” says Steve Hader, a lawyer with the Charlotte office of Moore & Van Allen who helped set up Beckham’s upcoming visit to the United States. “Maybe you want the best and the brightest.”

The Beckhams stand to make money on their upcoming summer trip, so they are required to secure work visas, not tourist credentials. He launched a youth soccer academy in Los Angeles last year, with the hope of identifying and nurturing talent to compete for U.S. teams on the world stage.

Victoria has a fragrance and clothing line “and still performs,” Hader says.

Some 11,960 esteemed scientists, doctors, musicians, professors, athletes and captains of industry and their family and support personnel arrived in 2005, up more than 145 percent since 1995, according to the State Department’s Bureau of Consular Affairs.

Hader has prepared O-1 visas for A-list singers, actors, actresses, scientists and even a celebrity chef. Client confidentiality precludes him from revealing names. Beckham gave the OK because he wants the press for his academy.

O-1 applicants must be international superstars in their professions. The State Department recognizes Academy Awards, peer adulation, press coverage in “major newspapers,” and/or “a high salary … in relation to others in the field,” among other factors.

Beckham plays for the Spanish club Real Madrid and is captain of England’s national team in this year’s World Cup. Beckham’s celebrity arguably has eclipsed that of Brazilian soccer great Pele.

Beckham was memorialized in the 2002 movie “Bend It Like Beckham” for has his signature long kick, with the ball curving in flight. The fact Beckham is married to one of the Spice Girls is an added bonus, or curse depending on which side of the paparazzi you’re standing.

Hader is the former general attorney for the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service in the late ‘80s with extensive ties to the international legal community. He met Beckham a couple of years ago through fellow lawyer connections in England. In May he escorted the Beckhams and their small entourage to the U.S. embassy in Madrid to retrieve their visas. He recalls fans and the paparazzi hollering as the couple ducked into their waiting limousine along Calle Serrano – Madrid’s Park Avenue.

The embassy received the Beckhams during off hours, when the building is not open to the public.

“The American consulate is very accommodating of the needs that high-profile celebrities have,” Hader says.

State Department officials interviewed the Beckham group about the intent of their visit and duration of stay, part of stepped-up security after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

In this case, the interview was mostly formality. Weeks before Hader had arranged payment of a $1,000 premium processing fee per visa application to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. This was on top of the basic $190 per person application fee.

Hader declined to say what he charges. However, immigration lawyers say the fees for helping a celebrity client obtain a visa ranges from $5,000 to $15,000.

Without the additional payment, the approval could have taken three months or more. With the payment, CIS returned Beckham’s approval within 15 days.

“The process seems to have the capability of doing its job if you pay money,” Hader says.

Premium processing can be used on any type of work-related visas.

“We move it to the front of the line because they paid for the privilege,” says CIS spokesman Chris Bentley.

As in any bureaucratic encounter, facing a friendly official also helps.

Canadian stock-car driver Pete Shepherd says there were about seven families in line at the border immigration office last month, and a U.S. official “moved me in front of all of them, pretty much.”

Roush Racing in Mooresville tabbed the 19-year-old as a driver of extraordinary ability and secured an O-1 visa for him. The company will groom him in open-wheel and selected closed-wheel courses for an eventual shot at NASCAR’s big time.

Fortunately for Shepherd, the U.S. immigration official was a race fan. “He called me and I was in and out,” Shepherd says. “He was almost excited.”

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