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I'm Peter Roberts, immigration attorney, who does work for YC and startups. AMA
131–140 of 486 posts
Re: I'm Peter Roberts, immigration attorney, who does work for YC and startups. AMA
#132Is asking about Recurse Center on-topic? I wanted to apply, but I genuinely don't consider it safe to travel to the US. As far as I can tell there is no comparable bootcamp-style retreat in EU :(
I am not sure if it helpful to you, but I did RC remotely and my experience was great
That is helpful to me! How did it work? I imagine a lot of RC interactions are kind of spontaneous, and I never understood how that would translate over the internet.
Re: I'm Peter Roberts, immigration attorney, who does work for YC and startups. AMA
#133Hi Peter, thanks for doing this AMA. I am traveling to the US soon for work from Europe. I have been reading a lot of articles about detentions at US airports and phone checks. My mindset has always been to never give my personal phone for an inspection, but times has changed now and it has been happening a lot more frequently. I am wondering what is the best course of action, prior to travel and if asked to give you…
The short answer is that CBP has the right to ask to see your electronic devices and you have the right to refuse but if you refuse (and you are not a U.S. green card holder or citizen), CBP likely will deny you admission and send you home.
I had a friend who was asked to unlock her phone, and she did, and then… they did nothing. They watched her do it and moved on to the next question.
Seems like asking someone to do this is just a good test to see the kind of individual they’re dealing with. It’s not practical to thoroughly search phones at scale and plus they know people can just have burner phones anyway. If you’re cagey and combative they know you’re a problem.
Re: I'm Peter Roberts, immigration attorney, who does work for YC and startups. AMA
#134Are O1 visa applications getting significantly more scrutiny nowadays? I comfortably qualify for one, based on the USCIS criteria, but my employer (big tech company, big law firm for immigration) wants to wait one more year for another H1B attempt before trying this. Hence I am wondering if switching jobs could potentially help here.
Big tech is risk averse and avoids pursuing O-1s unless there's no other option and the candidate/employee is highly valued. But I haven't seen any change yet in the adjudication of O-1 petitions. Nearly all our O-1 petitions still get approved and when we receive a Request for Additional Evidence (or RFE), the issues raised are the same issues that were raised before January 2025.
Is it true that most big tech companies and possibly the startups you work with strongly prefer H-1B transfers over candidates who might have held an H-1B in the past (with an approved I-140), but are currently on a B-2? In your experience/opinion, is such a situation disadvantageous to the candidate's competitiveness in attaining employment at these coveted companies?
Re: I'm Peter Roberts, immigration attorney, who does work for YC and startups. AMA
#135How hard is it to get approval for an o1 visa with no bachelors degree?
Re: I'm Peter Roberts, immigration attorney, who does work for YC and startups. AMA
#136Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not yet. The main changes that we're seeing are with CBP at the ports of entry. CBP is being much more aggressive in questioning those seeking admission, including searching electronic devices and even detaining applicants. But nearly all our filings are still getting approved.
I've been through customs all over the world for the past forty years, and US customs are some of the worst human beings I've ever encountered. Why is that function such a shit show? Very familiar with the need for LEO dumping grounds, especially at the federal level, so that's been my working assumption but I've never asked.
Because it can be, and nearly every administration has a ‘tough on illegal immigration’ stance - because the US is so desirable to go to.
A good Great Depression economic reset + insane facist government will reset that a little - but it will still be better than a huge number of places on the globe. Even if the gov’t targets immigrants.
A huge number of places with massive populations of people who would love to come over.
Re: I'm Peter Roberts, immigration attorney, who does work for YC and startups. AMA
#137[deleted]
Re: I'm Peter Roberts, immigration attorney, who does work for YC and startups. AMA
#138Earlier quoted context omitted.
The standard for employment-based permanent residency (green card) is extraordinarily high. As in, would likely place you in the top 1-5% of the most successful people in the country. That, or you have to invest $800k and create 10 jobs. No other country in the world requires foreigners to be significantly more qualified than its own population. You can move to France with a regular paying job no problem or just a fe…
> You can move to France with a regular paying job no problem or just a few thousand euros in savings Unless something has changed dramatically in the last decade this is patently false. Getting an EU work permit was historically very hard with employers having to demonstrate that a position can't be filled by an EU citizen before a non-EU citizen candidate can be considered.
Indeed those are the rules but on a practical level it seems pretty simple to get a visa if the company had an even reasonably competitive process. Though I moved to Europe 12 years ago (and went through getting work permits twice), maybe it's gotten harder.
Re: I'm Peter Roberts, immigration attorney, who does work for YC and startups. AMA
#139Hi peter, do you use any legal specific ai software ? Do you use ChatGPT in your work?
Re: I'm Peter Roberts, immigration attorney, who does work for YC and startups. AMA
#140Hi Peter,
My I-140 was approved in June 2013 under the EB2 category (H1B). I later downgraded to EB3 and filed my I-485 when my priority date became current back in 2021. I received my EAD in 2022 and have been working on EAD since then.
According to the current visa bulletin, my priority date is expected to become current soon. However, I have a couple of concerns:
The job title I had when I filed the I-485 is different from my current role.
I have also changed employers since then.
I understand that I may need to submit a new I-485J.
Given that I was promoted and my current title is significantly different from the one in my original petition, could this pose any challenges to my I-485 application?