I'm Peter Roberts, immigration attorney who does work for YC and startups. AMA

[proberts]

I'll be here for the next 4-5 hours and then again for anther 2 hours. I'll be guided by whatever you're concerned with. Please remember that I can't provide legal advice on specific cases for obvious liability reasons since I won't have access to all the facts and documents. Please stick to a factual discussion in your questions and comments and I'll try to do the same in my answers!

[jb12]

Hi Peter! You did my E3 visa a while back. When I was standing in line at the US consulate in Sydney, the person in front of me was really nervous, visibly shaking. I saw that their papers had your letterhead, so I was able to calm them down a bit by showing them my papers, which also had your letterhead.

Thanks for all your hard work!

[moralestapia]

Hi Peter,

Could you shed some light about what kind of profile could apply for (and get) an O1 visa? Specifically, if I have a tech company set up in the US that's pulling some decent revenue, is it worth applying for an O1? What other circumstances come into play against/in favor of this?

I've seen a lot of advisors and "influencers" all over the web saying that it's "easy". I don't think that's the case because nothing in US immigration is easy, unless your net worth is like 9 figures, maybe; but if it's not that far-fetched I may consider applying for one.

Alternatively, could one sponsor its own H1B visa? I guess the actual underlying question is: if I'm an entrepreneur with a real, solid company based in the US (but I'm not in the US and not a US citizen), what is the best way for me to move there and keep working at my company?

[proberts]

I wouldn't characterize an O-1 as easy but it's often within reach of talented professionals, particularly founders. At the end of the day, the issue is less about the quality of the evidence - although that matters - and more about the existence of evidence that checks at least 3 boxes/criteria. And now, with the recent public announcements from the Administration, O-1 petitions with an AI component have an even greater chance of approval.

[Swizec]

I have gotten two O1's and then the greencard version (EB2). It isn't easy in the "not a lot of work" sense, it's easy in the "not random" sense. If you put in the work (that also helps your career), tick off the required boxes, and present the evidence correctly, you will get the visa.

But yes an O1 takes a shitload of work.

[mingyeow]

How about a blockchain founder?

[CrunchyJams]

For anyone considering working with Peter, our firm has been a client for 10 years, have sponsored 5-10 green cards and 20+ visas. Peter has been amazing to work with and we've gotten emphatic thank you notes from people we recommended to him.

[lemiant]

Worked with peter for 8 years from 3 founders to 300 employees. They are great

[r-johnv]

Do you know the best way to contact Peter or his firm? Looking them up online I find broken links to the firm website.

I've been looking for an immigration attorney who specializes in EB1A for an early engineer in the startup founding team with a small number of publication (<30) but significant patent commercialization (2 granted patents >$2 million value). NIW is unfortunately not a good option due to the country backlog.

[thewinnie]

Hi Peter,

I'm a solo founder of software development company in USA. I've been doing everything on B1/B2 visa until goverment told me I spending too much time in USA and they cancelled my visa with recommendations to look for other options.

I tried to apply for E2 during covid and it took them almost 6 months to process my case but they declined it with a general reason that they don't see enough evidance to issue E2 for me at this moment but I can re-apply anytime if my situation change. (I applied by myself without any lawyer at all)

After consultations with different attorney I've been told that E2 is more for people who wants to invest but since I'm already established working business it might not be a good fit for me. And yeah they do recommend me to look on O1

1. Is it something interesting for you? Can I get paid consultation from you and maybe you'll help me?

2. Is it true that for existing established business with solo-founders E2 might be not a good fit?

Thank you in advance!

[cromka]

Wait, you created a company in the USA while on B1/B2 visa and they voided your visa because you spent too much time, not because you opened and worked for your own company, something that is typically only possible with a permanent residency?

As someone who was very religious about his H1B in the past and had given up on a couple of simple passive income ideas only because I couldn’t incorporate, I feel a bit… naive.

[marymkearney]

Hi, if you have enough business track record to assemble an E2 package, then it's likely you'd be a good candidate for O-1 also.

[proberts]

1. I'd be happy to speak with you and go through your options. 2. That's not the most important factor; we do E-2s for existing businesses and solo founders all the time.

[efitz]

I have a lot of friends at work that have H1B visas. They try to get green cards but the process drags out often for more than a decade. Why is it so hard for people who want to be here, and who have well paying jobs, to get green cards?

[8ytecoder]

There’s a limit on number of green cards per year. Then there’s a hard limit of 7% of that per country. There’s also a priority system with Family coming first. The combination of three results in a really long wait time for Indians without family (who are citizens) in the US moving on H1B. The current priority date is 2012 if I’m not wrong. It did progress faster during the pandemic but got quickly rolled back. Remember that those who come on H1B are already capped per year.

https://travel.state.gov/content/travel/en/legal/visa-law0/v...

[csomar]

It’s country based. I have family and it took them less than 6 months. For Indian and Chinese, they can forget about it.

[toyg]

Surely you should ask that to your Congressman, not a lawyer...

[canucker2016]

I recall hearing that the wait time for green card approval depends on the home country of the applicant. There were a lot of applicants from India when I talked with people who were getting a green card. So the wait for an Indian applicant was much longer than, say, an applicant from Canada.

Not sure what the wait times are now, but I doubt the USA has caught up on the Indian wait list, esp. during/after the pandemic.

[fallingknife]

Because people with high paying jobs have political power as a class and it is in our interest to make importing foreign competition difficult.

People with low paying jobs do not have political power and are unable to set up legal protection for themselves.

[maxFlow]

Hi Peter. Thanks for your AMAs, always a source of great value.

A couple of questions from me:

1. Which would you say are the top spececializations within tech that employers are most willing to sponsor visas for nowadays?

2. Would you say the willingness to sponsor tech professionals has lessened somewhat as of late? Given the economic climate, opportunities to hire remote globally, etc.

3. Are there any impactful immigration reforms we should keep a watchful eye for, vis a vis the 2024 US presidential election?

Thanks & all the best.

[bubbleRefuge]

A company in California wants to push me out the door unfairly and I'm a remote employee in another state and want to fight it or get some just compensation, should I consult an attorney in California or my state. ? (edit: sorry just noticed this is regarding immigration law only )

[wrp]

When a USA citizen meets abroad and wants to marry a non-USA citizen, with the intention of the non-USA citizen pursuing permanent residence in the USA, does it have any effect on the process which country they get married in?

I've heard this and similar concerns from employees of multinationals who meet someone while at an overseas branch. They want to do what they can to avoid snags.

[Firmwarrior]

I was in this boat back in 2017, and a lawyer working with my FAANG company advised me off the record that our best bet was to visit the USA, and suddenly have a surge of loving feelings and spontaneously get married in a tiny impromptu ceremony. Then apply for a change of status while in the USA.

I probably should have listened to her.. I did it the "right" way since I wanted to quit that job anyway. Got married abroad and filed an I-130. It took like 18 months to get it, it was nuts. I'm a native-born US citizen and my wife is from Japan, no criminal records or anything, and I was making 3-5x the national median household income this whole time, so it's not like there was anything tricky about our case.

I'd recommend you just talk to a lawyer. I hired a lawyer for our case, and it was about $3k total. It would've been entirely doable without the lawyer's help, but it was easier that way and I helped fund her charity work where she helps refugees and domestic abuse victims.

[proberts]

It doesn't matter where they get married as long as the marriage is valid where it occurs and under U.S. law. The location of the process abroad is based on the non-U.S.-citizens's country of citizenship or country of residence. Regarding the specific process, whether in the U.S. through USCIS or abroad through the State Department/U.S. Consulate, definitely consult an immigration attorney to understand the timing, requirements, and risks.

[zie]

Only if they pursue a Fiance Visa, which is(last I checked) usually the best way for the non-USA citizen to get their green card. A Fiance visa requires the marriage happen in the USA(after receiving the VISA).

[csomar]

Hey. I’m from Tunisia so I can relate a bit.

1. Build travel history. If you can get a Schengen, go get it and have a short trip to Europe.

2. Get the B1/B2 visa. It’s relatively easy for north africans. If you can enter the US with it, go for it, though flights can be expensive.

3. Apply for the canadian visa. 95% you’ll be approved for it.

[nojvek]

Tourist/business visas for short period is relatively easy.

Have to prove you have enough funds while you’re there and will definitely come back - show you have house/apartment/family and return ticket.

[jkaplowitz]

Disclaimer up front: I am neither Peter nor a lawyer. Listen to Peter if he disagrees with what I write here about the US option. If you do hire a lawyer for help on any Canadian immigration matter, make sure they are licensed in Canada, which Peter may or may nor be. Certain other authorized representatives like a Regulated Canadian Immigration Consultant (RCIC) can help you as well, but anyone who is taking your money for help on this may be breaking Canadian law if they aren't in one of these authorized categories:

https://www.canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees-citizenship/se...

All of the links in this comment are to official Government of Canada webpages.

Doing it legally in the US is difficult, since you'd probably be breaking the law by working remotely in the US, even for a Canadian company, whether or not you're legally an employee or a contractor, without a work authorization that's infeasible to get in this context. If your activities stay within the allowed boundaries of US business visitors then it might be okay on a B-1 or B-1/B-2 visa. For example, meeting with colleagues at a company event, but not if your activities while present go beyond the definition of meetings into the US immigration law definition of work. If they do consider it as unauthorized work, you'll get refused entry (or refused the visa) and have lots of annoying consequences for future visa or travel plans.

But it is probably possible to do this in Canada with full legitimacy.

The first step of analyzing this is to decide whether these activities meet the Canadian immigration law definition of work:

https://www.canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees-citizenship/co...

If you are paid directly by the Canadian company, it's very possible that your activities during the trip would indeed be considered work. If you need an expert to apply the law to your specific facts, you or your employer should hire a lawyer or other authorized representative (as above).

If your activities do count as work under Canadian immigration law, the next step is to see if you would be exempt from needing a work permit for this work. Here is the info on those exemptions:

https://www.canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees-citizenship/co...

If I am interpreting things correctly, you probably don't qualify for the business visitor exemption if you are paid directly by the Canadian company, but you might if you are paid by a foreign company, even if they are a subsidiary or parent company of the Canadian company.

But most likely you would qualify for the short-term high-skilled work public policy, linked near the bottom of that page. You'll have to make sure that your job duties qualify, but as a web developer they probably do. And you'll also need to limit your trip to within the required 15- or 30-day period - probably a maximum of 30 days if you've never done this in the last year.

Assuming you are exempt from a work permit, step one is to make sure you have a passport from Morocco. Then, most likely you need to apply for a Canadian visitor visa:

https://www.canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees-citizenship/se...

There is a exception which allows Moroccans to use the easier eTA pre-approval process in narrow circumstances, but if you have never had a visa from Canada and don't currently have a visa from the US, that exception doesn't apply.

If your visitor visa is denied, unfortunately you'll have to pick somewhere else to meet. Being young and unmarried and with skills relevant to the Canadian tech industry and merely renting rather than owning a property back in Morocco is somewhat of a risk in the eyes of the visa officials, since they know it would be easy for you to overstay illegally if you were so inclined. However, they also want Canadian companies to be able to meet with their staff, of course, and nothing you're proposing is illegal. They make a judgment about what they think is likely to happen, and they could say yes.

If you do finally get a Canadian visitor visa in your Moroccan passport, plan your flights to Canada. There are no direct flights from Morocco to Canada, so you will have to connect through one or more other countries.

Some countries will require that you get either a visitor visa or a transit visa for that country in order to connect through that country, even if you don't plan to leave the airport there. Notably, the US has a requirement like this, so don't connect through the US unless you first get a US visitor or transit visa (harder than for Canada).

Happily, although the Schengen Area of Europe normally requires a Schengen visa for Moroccans to enter, they don't require a visa for Moroccans who are just flying into a Schengen airport and then flying to a non-Schengen destination like Canada without crossing the Schengen passport control boundary. Even for nationalities where they do require a visa for that case, they allow an exception if you have a Canadian visa.

So, your best bet in terms of flight routing is to have two international flights in each direction, one between Morocco and almost any European country and a second flight between that same European airport and Canada. If you need further flights within Canada, those can be booked together with the two international flights.

That's most of it. Then lodging, currency, etc but this comment is long enough already.

Good luck!

[ksoped]

Hi Peter, what are my employment options as a programmer who (long story short qualifies for DACA) is completely undocumented. Not a citizen, not a resident but living in the US. I'm working with a local company and doing work as a 1099 Contractor, but this along with freelance can be limiting. I would much rather work with a big(ger) company, but unfortunately I don't have work authorization. Am I right in assuming there's no way for me to get hired at a real company? Or are there workarounds I'm not aware about?

[lucasfcosta]

Quick testimonial from a YC startup that had Peter's assistance for us to go to the batch earlier this year: Peter is great. He gave us great advice and helped us out with how to fill out an urgent application for a visa for my co-founder. Would highly recommend him.

[boplicity]

Maybe this is too far outside your area. I'm an American living in Canada, and am leery about the best legal structure for my business. Cross border accounting is a nightmare. Any advice?

[proberts]

Unfortunately, that is outside my area. I just always refer these questions to accountants.

[wxnx]

I really want to know this, too.

[hailmac]

Hope I'm not too late, thank you for doing this AMA! I would love to hear your thoughts on the 50% ownership requirement of the E-2 visa, which I imagine can be restrictive when raising capital or splitting among co-founders. Can you outline generally how you advise your clients on this? For example, do you go the route of finding investors of the same nationality as the E-2 holder?

A final larger question would be does the requirement apply for the whole duration of the visa? If so, how is this tracked?

[proberts]

Here, success can be an enemy of the E-2 visa if the company receives additional funding that dilutes the ownership interest below 50%. The E-2 is a great options for many founders/companies but at the outset, a contingency immigration plan should be put in place to deal with the loss of the E-2 (such as the O-1 or green card).

[awei]

Hello Peter,

Thank you for taking the time to provide insightful answers to our questions.

My question concerns EB-1 visas and greencards for extraordinary ability. The usual route to prove 'extraordinary ability' seems heavily skewed towards those with scientific publications under their belt. Would it be possible to qualify for a software engineer leaning towards tangible tech contributions, for example significant commits to open source projects and building online products with a decent user base ?

[marymkearney]

Hi, yes, you're right, most of the info out there is for researchers and academics. It's not a template that fits well for makers and engineers in private industry, who actually build real things and sell them.

There's an EB-1A template that works much better for proving extraordinary ability for industry accomplishments. It's just not well-known or publicized.

If you have open-source commits and users for your products, then you're well on your way to a successful EB-1A portfolio.

The "academic EB-1A" template is such a universal pain point for tech founders and engineers, that I just launched an online course (my first! yay) on this topic. It explains how to structure O-1s and EB-1As for industry tech and engineering specialties, not academia. https://pro.visabuilder.com/tech-toolbox-product-page

[proberts]

Absolutely! Most of the EB1As we handle are not done for scientists, they are not done for those with a significant number of impactful publications, they are done for engineers and founders.

[doctorpangloss]

1. Do you foresee significant changes in immigration policy in the next 20 years? With many working under temporary status for as much as a decade, seems more relevant than ever to predict the future. Which, I'm sure, you hate to do. But this is for fun.

2. In your opinion, is there a way to live under the regime that 10-17m illegal aliens in the US seemingly do every day, but to be an entrepreneur? Is it really going to be true that such status limits you to living in poverty, or even to the middle class? As most tech entrepreneurs fail, is it intellectually honest to say that illegal status prohibits you from being a successful entrepreneur?

3. Why is the tech industry more compliant than other industries regarding work authorization, immigration status & residency status issues? Or is it not? In your opinion, is it behind the trend compared to other industries, or ahead? In other industries, like healthcare, agriculture, education and hospitality, rules seem more lax provided the roles are vaguely lower class, but I am generalizing. What do you think is special about tech besides pay?

[proberts]

1. I've been doing this a long time and major changes in immigration law are very rare and require some type of consensus among the different parties and branches. So, as much as the system needs to be fixed, I don't think the fixes will be legislative. 2. Of course, there are additional challenges but I know many entrepreneurs who are not in valid status or at one time were not in valid status. But it's tough. 3. I think because the need is so great in the tech industry and it seems that it can be hard to find the right talent.

[yagyu]

Are there good ways for US companies to host international grad students in their internship programs? How hard is it for them?

Specifically I had a conversation with a few administrators at universities in Sweden and this question came up on behalf of their students.

Thanks for regularly showing up here. I went EB2NIW some years ago and still get ptsd reading these threads. Hang in there everyone struggling with immigration.

[rosmax_1337]

Do you find that northern-european immigrants end up happy after immigration to the US, given the circumstances which you meet them in? The US is quite a different social environment, while still also being quite similar to northern europe in many ways.

Certainly "your field" per se, but if you follow up on clients I figured you might have a better clue than most.

[pizzalife]

Probably not something Peter can answer.. but I'm from northern europe and yes, I'm happy here and would never want to go back.

[dahlio]

What's the best practice for a founder or startup employee who is on a work visa in the US but works remotely / nomadically and doesn't have a fixed address (from an immigration perspective)? Use mailforwarding? Ask to use a friend's address? Is that frowned upon by USCIS?

[simonw]

What are some non-obvious mistakes we can make that might threaten our immigration status, for different classes (for example H1B vs got-a-green-card)?

[proberts]

For green cards, it's really more about what can you do to increase your chances; for nonimmigrant work visas, the main issues are (these probably aren't non-obvious, to answer your question) unauthorized employment, overstay, criminal record, and immigration fraud.

[bestbuyer__]

Hi Peter.

If someone, say a Canadian, overstays their tourist visa in the states by more than 6 months and are then banned from re-entering for 3 or 10 years, what are their options for fixing their immigration situation? If they receive a job offer (TN Visa or H1B) would that fix it?

Thank you

[proberts]

There are temporary waivers available.