Mairbek Taisumov is booked at the moment to face top fifteen ranked light Evan Dunham in two-plus months at UFC 223.
The fighter has dealt with a plethora of visa issues in the past, which the lightweight says is responsible for stalling his professional MMA career.
“Right now, the UFC lawyers are working on it,” Taisumov told MMA Fighting. “I feel it will all be done very soon. All I can do is wait. It’s probably going to be a few more weeks, but from what I’ve heard I will finally get my visa. The process is ongoing, like I said the UFC lawyers are working on it, but they are very confident that everything will be okay. I really hope that it doesn’t happen to me (that the bout gets canceled). It happened to me already, so I just hope this time that I can get my visa and everything will be okay. I really need it now. This whole visa process has been holding my career back.”
Visa issues have canceled or delayed UFC bouts in the past, with the most recent being a welterweight division encounter between Kamaru Usman and Emil Meek. Which was pushed from a December UFC card to UFC Fight Night St. Louis due to Meek’s visa issues.
Taisumov doesn’t know exactly why their are visa issues, but the one thing the fighter knows is that he isn’t the problem.
“I’m not the problem. I’m just a sportsman; I’ve never done any kind of crime in my life. I’ve never done any bad things to people. I’m a good person and there’s nothing I have done in my life that would stop me from getting a visa, but I’ve still had trouble getting it. The strange thing is, I’ve been in America before; I had a two-year working visa. I’ve fought in America and everything was okay. I just came back after my fight and everything was fine. Now, it seems I can’t get my visa, and I don’t know why. It’s just politics, but it has a big effect on normal people like me. I really feel like it’s holding my career back,” says Taisumov.
UFC 223 takes place on Saturday, April 7 from the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York with Tony Ferguson and Khabib Nurmagomedov headlining. Fightful is providing live coverage of the event, with a post-show podcast to follow.
