Yesterday, Felix Walworth of Told Slant, who were set to play Austin’s South By Southwest this month, posted a portion of the festival’s contract that detailed the repercussions of playing non-festival-sanctioned shows during the weeklong event, with one of the outcomes being possible deportation for international artists. Today, SXSW CEO and co-founder Roland Swenson has released a statement concerning the allegation.

“We were sorry to learn that one of our invited performers chose to cancel their performance at this year’s SXSW Music Festival due to a misunderstanding of our policies regarding international artists,” Swenson says. “We understand that given the current political climate surrounding immigration, the language that was published seems strong. Violating U.S. immigration law has always carried potentially severe consequences, and we would be remiss not to warn our participating acts of the likely repercussions.”

The CEO goes on to say that the language concerning the showcase policy has been in the artist agreement for years and is there to protect both the artists and the festival in the case of a serious incident occurring at a non-sanctioned event.

“We hope never to be put in the position to act on this. Indeed, we spend a great deal of time communicating with international artists concerning numerous issues, including how to avoid issues at U.S. ports of entry,” Swenson continues. “SXSW has been vocal in its opposition to President Trump’s Travel Ban and is working hard to build a coalition of attorneys to assist artists with issues at U.S. ports of entry during the event. We have artists from 62 countries from around the world performing and have always supported our international music community. We have never reported international showcasing artists to immigration authorities.”