NJPW Has A Backup Plan If Another Government Shutdown Causes Them Problems

New Japan Pro Wrestling had a nice little tour scheduled and then the United States government shut down and all of the visas they put in during November were frozen. This means that NJPW will be holding show without Japanese talent.

Of course, this is worse for all of the workers who are forced to show up to their jobs without a paycheck, but it was still a big issue for NJPW. Donald Trump re-opened the government for three weeks and made a lot of hints about this issue happening again. That is as political as this article will get, but it had to be done in order to tell this story.

Mike Johnson said on PW Insider Elite audio that NJPW has a backup plan in place just in case the US government goes into another shutdown. After all, they have a huge Madison Square Garden show in April.

“I was told that if need be there is a fail-safe for New Japan. Because basically as it was explained to me the problem was not getting visas done. Ring Of Honor was able to get Rush’s visa done.”

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“The problem was that New Japan, a company that the United States government that the American government had never done visas for was trying to get a dozen visas or whatever it was. So there was going to be a number of questions about New Japan. Who are these people? What are they doing? Why do they need to come here?”

“If it was an American company that had been through this process a million times whoever handling it would have saw the history and said, ‘Ah yeah these guys.’ — Boom — Just stamp it and move it on. I’m simplifying it but because of the shutdown of the gears what took New Japan maybe a month to take care of took far longer than they ever expected.”

“I was told that nobody needed to worry about the G1 Supershow and that need-be it will be taken case of even if Ring Of Honor has to step in and assist.”

It would be pretty bad if NJPW talent couldn’t work the MSG show on WrestleMania weekend, but it would be even worse if the government shut down again. So let’s just hope neither of things happen.

If you use the quotes in this article credit Ringside News