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

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

#21

Hi Peter, thanks for doing the AMA! I have a Delaware registered LLC (10 years old), I managed to get even an EIN remotely. However, I can't open a bank account remotely and so I have just been paying the registered agent fees and Delaware gov taxes for the LLC all these years. I however, genuinely want to come to the states to open the bank account and actually expand my business into the US. The LLC hasn't really h…

But you _can_ open a bank account remotely for a DE LLC. Both Wise and Mercury supported this for years.

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

#24
post #7

Could you please help with any insights about the social media vetting rules? This has been a blackbox to the visa applications - started with student visas, now being forced on work visas too from Dec 15th.

That's right, both before US Consulates when applying for visas, before CBP when applying for admission, and before USCIS when applying for a benefit (H-1B, O-1, green card, etc.), social media is being reviewed, not across-the-board but more and more. And there's really no option to keep social media as private if asked to turn to public by a Consular Officer or CBP Officer. The review is broad and not limited to so…

CBP actually made me give them my facebook password when entering on a J1 visa in 2017, so I'm surprised to hear so much talk about this. Is it more that the practice of checking social media is more widespread now?

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

#25
I know this is a general question, but:

Assuming a US startup is considering engineering hires outside the United States, how does one currently assess the likelihood of getting them a visa to work in the USA? And what timeline and cost would be involved?

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

#26
In October, the state department introduced a new policy:

> Applicants for U.S. nonimmigrant visas (NIV) should schedule their visa interview appointments at the U.S. Embassy or Consulate in their country of nationality or residence

> Applicants must be able to demonstrate residence in the country where they are applying, if the place of application is based on their residency.

What sort of proof is required to demonstrate residence? What about cases where an applicant legally has residency in a particular country (e.g. PR card or work visa) but in practice lives in the US as an H-1B/TN/L-1/O-1/etc. worker or H-4/TD/L-2/O-3/etc. dependant? Especially for the dual intent visas?

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

#29
A question about TN status for a Canadian living in the US. There are some income-generating things I'd like to do outside of my work visa (play a music gig, upload music to Spotify, act in a movie). My understanding is that I can't do these things in the US. Am I able to do these things if I do them outside of the country, or is there any way to make them work? For example, if I went to Canada, recorded an album, uploaded it, then came back to the US.
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