In Rohit Srinivasa’s childhood home in California, immigration wasn’t a distant policy matter debated in Congress. It was an everyday reality, the centerpiece of family dinners, community gatherings, and conversations with friends.

“There was never a meeting or family gathering where immigration wasn’t discussed,” he recalls. “It was always there — relevant, important, and sometimes a source of worry.”

That constant presence became more than background noise. It was the formative influence that eventually drew Srinivasa into immigration law. After law school, while many classmates gravitated toward corporate or litigation careers, he felt a pull toward the specialty that had shaped so many lives around him.

At a mid-sized corporation immigration firm in Los Angeles, he entered the field through EB-5 investor visas — a category then surging in popularity. “What struck me,” he says, “was that here was a pathway where you didn’t need a sponsor. You could leverage your capital, and carve out your own immigration journey.”

That realization opened a broader question: What other pathways allowed immigrants to take control of their future without waiting on an employer or a family sponsor? The answer — national interest waivers, EB-1 extraordinary ability visas, and O-1s for founders — has shaped the arc of his career.

Today, Srinivasa runs a boutique practice that focuses on precisely those categories. “Every time I’d hear someone say, ‘My company doesn’t sponsor,’ I wanted to show them there was another way,” he says.

He has built a career around helping scientists, researchers, entrepreneurs, and creatives not only obtain visas but secure the autonomy to pursue their work on their own terms. Many of his clients have gone on to lead unicorn startups or transform entire sectors. “It’s a privilege to play a small part in their journey,” he reflects. “To see them succeed — and know the U.S. benefits as well — that’s incredibly fulfilling.”

The demand is only accelerating. For Indian and Chinese nationals, decades-long backlogs in the EB-2 and EB-3 categories have left families stuck in limbo. “Some children grow up their entire lives here as non-immigrants,” Srinivasa says. “By the time they’re 21, they age out, and suddenly the family faces separation. It’s devastating.”

Self-petition pathways like EB-1A and NIW offer a way out of that limbo, and demand has surged. The O-1A, too, has become what Srinivasa calls a “de facto startup visa.” In the absence of a formal U.S. program for entrepreneurs, founders are leveraging the O-1 to join accelerators, raise funding, and build companies. “That’s become our bread and butter,” he says, “because the U.S. still has the best startup ecosystem. Founders just need a viable way to stay.”

Despite his optimism, Srinivasa is blunt about structural flaws in the U.S. system. Chief among them: per-country caps that keep Indian and Chinese nationals waiting years, sometimes decades, for green cards.

“I understand the rationale, but it’s outdated,” he says. “It doesn’t account for population differences, and it doesn’t account for the contributions these immigrants are already making.”

The human costs are stark. “I’ve seen families torn apart. Parents are on the final step toward their green card, but their child has aged out and must return to a country they barely know. That’s not holistic immigration policy.”

He argues for separating the EB-2 NIW category from standard EB-2 petitions and reevaluating it on its own merits. “The NIW has a higher standard than employer-sponsored EB-2s. Treating them the same doesn’t make sense if we want to incentivize talent that benefits the national interest.”