Travis Murphy: The Need for Sports Diplomacy

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Travis Murphy’s work background is a fascinating one, and one that you may not realize is a key component of the sports industry behind the scenes. Before starting his company Jetr Global Sport + Entertainment, he previously served as the senior director of international government affairs for the National Basketball Association. In that role, he helped thousands of NBA, WNBA, 2K, G League, and Basketball Africa League teams, players, staff and their families navigate the complicated world of global travel. He also managed the NBA’s relationships with the Department of Homeland Security, Department of State, and other government institutions, working with those government partners to create sustainable basketball initiatives both domestically and abroad. In that regard, he also played a key role in the release of Brittney Griner from her detainment in Russia in 2022. Murphy has extensive international experience, having served as a diplomat in the United States Foreign Service, working at embassies in Ecuador, Suriname and Cote d’Ivoire to name a few. And he also served in Washington, D.C., in the Sports Diplomacy Division of the Department of State.

All of that background puts him in a unique position to advocate for policy changes in Washington around issues of immigration that stand to have large impacts on some of the largest events headed to the United States. In just one area — but one with outsized importance — the issue of wait times for visitors to get an appointment for a visa to visit the United States is raising some serious alarms. In Colombia, for example, there is nearly a two-year wait time to get one of those appointments, meaning if you are a traveler hoping to watch the Colombian team at the 2026 World Cup, you’re already too late. In this conversation, we talk about why those waits are so long in so many countries around the world and what our industry can be doing to help reduce those times. We also talk about the impact a new administration in Washington will have on the ability for spectators to easily come for international events and how the broader national discussion on immigration policy in general could impact that ability as well. It’s a deep dive into some serious but important topics that will have lasting implications on the willingness of event organizers overseas to consider the United States as a host to their events in the years to come.

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