Hi this is Jacob Sapochnick immigration attorney in San Diego, thank you for watching a video.
In this video I'm going to talk about a very interesting topic E2 Visa and how can you
get a green card from the E2 Visa.
Most people they get an E2 Visa, it's a non-immigrant investor Visa, they realize that there's no
way for them to get a green card only frequent renewals almost indefinitely renewals.
You can get frustrating after a while, because, well, you want to be an investor and live
and work in the business that you started at some point there is a desire to convert
the E2 Visa to the to a green card.
So how do we do it?
Well, the initial presumption is that there is no direct way to do it so if your own restaurant
and the company that you invested in owns your restaurant, that same company cannot
sponsor you for the green card because the E2 regulations prohibit that they specify
that E2 Visa is a non-immigrant visa.
So by doing that you can jeopardize the visa.
So how do we do it?
Well, the first option is the EB-5 Visa.
EB-5 basic green card allows any investor.
They can put half a million dollars into a regional center and get a
green card this way by investing in a government approved project or put a million dollars
in their own project as they expand their the E2 operation or they open an additional
company that will employ their workers and create substantial difference in the economy.
So EB-5 we've done quite a few videos on that and you can learn about that more but that's
a good option for somebody who is on an E2 visa right now and they know for sure that
they want to get a green card for different reasons, to have their family, make sure the
kids are about to turn 21 and they want to be able to keep them in the U.S.
So EB-5 is a great option.
Another option is the H1B Visa.
The H1B Visa allows people to be self-employed.
So if your business is doing well and you want to convert the E-visa to the H1B as a
self-employed entrepreneur that's another option.
If you do that it's important to follow the H1B entrepreneur rules and we have also videos
of that as well a key element is to have a separate board to allow you to be detached
from the operations of the company now by getting an H1B Visa after an E2, you can also
transition later on for a green card through that same company.
Again, it's not a very simple process but it's it's an option for people that require
the green card and H1B is another option.
Third option that we want to talk about is, if your spouse, husband or a wife get their
own visa, H1B Visa then the spouse employment will allow the E2 Visa person to be sponsored
riding with the wife or husbands petition.
We call this a derivative petition so say, a spouse is working for tech company they
get her H1- B visa and then that same company will get a green card the whole family will
ride with repetition and that's another way to transition from the E2 to the green card
through the spouse.
Another interesting way is if the e2 visas a person is not married and they're currently
in a relationship with a US citizen they'll be able to get a green card through marriage
it's called a petition the family petition through a spouse and that's a great way to
transition to a green card.
A final way that one of the mention is some of the E2 business owners are so exceptional,
that they are able to apply for what is called national interest waiver a self-petition green
card based on national interests so their business creates an impact on the economy
they are so highly skilled and their business can show the impact on the economy as a whole
where they can get a green card without an employer through a national interest waiver
as an entrepreneur.
Again, those are some recent changes that happen the past year or so and we've done
quite a few of those and we encourage our investor clients to explore the opportunity
because it's pretty good and will allow you to get a green card without involve of any
other company but your own business and your ideas.
Once again, if you have any questions on all the ideas we discuss in this video feel free
to post them in the comments or email us directly and we hope you enjoyed this video and we
look forward to creating more videos for you guys.