Interview with Mahsa Khanbabai, Founder, Khanbabai Immigration Law
By Shiva Karimi
It takes some fearlessness, but women attorneys have always been and continue to be legal entrepreneurs, hanging a shingle and opening and running law firms focused on issues important to them. Mahsa Khanbabai founded and runs Khanbabai Immigration Law. She was interviewed by Shiva Karimi, who is an Immigration Attorney and Managing Director for the Boston Office of McLane Middleton.
Shiva Karimi: Mahsa, tell us about your path to becoming a lawyer – how you got to where you are today.
Mahsa Khanbabai: Going to law school was something I kind of stumbled upon. My dad had encouraged me for many years, and thankfully, I listened to his advice and went to law school. When I graduated law school, I tried to find a job, but it was quite difficult because I had gone to school in New York and had moved back to Massachusetts where my family was. I didn’t really have any connections and didn’t know anyone at any law firms. And so, it was quite hard.
My dad, again, suggested, why don’t you just start your own practice? And so, I did. That was twenty-five years ago. I think it was one of the best decisions I ever made as I’ve loved working for myself. Immigration law is also something that I kind of just stumbled upon. Despite having been an immigrant and going through the process of getting a green card and naturalizing, I never really thought of immigration law as a career until I started my practice and was thinking, who could I help? What kind of law am I interested in? It was natural for me to work with people from all around the world because of my own upbringing in a small town in Western Mass with a local community hospital where many international physicians worked. I got to start working on immigration cases and loved it.
Shiva Karimi: Did you have any experience before starting your own practice?
Mahsa Khanbabai: I basically started straight out of law school. I was lucky enough to intern at a couple of law offices. So, it wasn’t like I had no idea what a law practice would look like . . . but basically, I did not have an idea of what a law practice should be, but for having interned in a couple of offices. I was learning along the way.
Shiva Karimi: Wow, so you took quite a leap of faith. What advice would you give to people considering law school?
Mahsa Khanbabai: If I had to give someone thinking about going to law school advice now, I would highly recommend going to law school somewhere that you are thinking of practicing and living because the connections that you make, the networks that you develop while in law school, will last you for your career and really help you develop that book of business that you want. As well as being able to refer cases to other attorneys. I have so many clients who ask me, do you know an attorney that deals with landlord/tenant law or who can help with a divorce? Having that network of fellow students that you went to law school with who’ve now become lawyers is really critical.
Shiva Karimi: I want to talk a little bit about how to develop networks, because I think you can give some wonderful advice. You said that you went to law school in New York. You said that you wished you had gone where you ended up settling, which is where your family is. I also happen to know some of your history about how you got into serving the medical community. How did you get into this particular practice area and develop your network?
Mahsa Khanbabai: Being an immigrant, being a Muslim woman from Iran, it was not easy to wedge my way into the legal profession. I wish I had known then what I know now, and thought about – what are my talents? What fits me and who I am and who my family is? I learned to lean into my immigrant community, the Muslim community, the medical community.
And so, through the natural course of talking to friends and neighbors and family, people started to hear, oh, Mahsa is an immigration lawyer and, hey, we need a physician to work at this medical practice in Western Mass. and it’s really hard to find physicians, but here is a physician who is from another country, and they need a visa to work. Why don’t we ask Mahsa to help? It was a perfect fit because my father was a physician and we came to the U.S. on the J visa, so I was already familiar with that visa category and was able to help this medical group.
And part of networking is just word of mouth. People get to know you, you do a good job, you’re compassionate, you’re caring, you’re diligent, and they tell their friends about you. Part of my career developed in the Muslim community by being at the mosque and hearing people talk about the problems they have, and especially, unfortunately, Muslims and people from the Middle East have had a very difficult time when it comes to immigration, especially after 9/11.
Immigration law is such a niche practice, and within this broader area, I have a particular focus on physician immigration cases and a deep understanding of the different issues facing clients from the Global South. For example, I represent Rümeysa Öztürk, the Tufts PhD student who was essentially kidnapped off the streets of Somerville by masked ICE agents. She was presented with no arrest warrant and had her student visa revoked because she co-authored an op-ed in her university newspaper calling for human rights and dignity for all, and for Tufts University to abide by the student senate resolutions calling to divest from Israel because of the genocide of the Palestinian people.
Because of my involvement in a network of lawyers helping international students involved in campus and community protests, I got the call to help Rumeysa and filed a habeas petition arguing that she was detained in violation of our constitutional rights to free speech. She has since been granted bail by a federal court judge, but she still has multiple court cases in the federal and immigration courts. It is a privilege to be able to work on such an important issue, the intersection of free speech and immigration.
Shiva Karimi: Tell us about your time as President of AILA New England, the American Immigration Lawyers Association, and how you decided to take on that demanding role and some of the other work that you do in that context.
Mahsa Khanbabai: The reason I spend so much time on AILA issues is that they relate to similar issues of access and justice. The legal profession has not always been great for women of color. And now, we are seeing so many more first-generation lawyers, immigrant lawyers, lawyers of color who are getting involved and advocating for issues that affect their communities. And that’s why DEI is so important—to make space for everybody at the table and make them feel like they are welcome and belong.
One of my passions within AILA, both AILA New England and AILA National, is to make sure that attorneys who have probably never had a mentor, and who didn’t have access to leadership, now have space to talk about what their clients are facing and what they themselves as lawyers need, not only for their practices to be better lawyers, but also for their mental health and wellbeing.
I see that so much right now within the immigration bar because of what we’re facing by this current administration and its impact upon our own communities. When we go home, we don’t leave our work. Our family and friends and neighbors ask us questions and we want to help. And so, we’re always on. That can be challenging. A lot of newer lawyers reach out to me saying, “I’m so upset, I don’t know how to deal with this. What can I do? I’m feeling overwhelmed.” I feel like that sometimes. I’m sure we all do. So a lot of my work these days is making sure that all lawyers, especially lawyers who work with or who are from communities that are being directly targeted by the current administration, whether it’s the Haitian community here in Massachusetts, or the Middle Eastern and Muslim communities, have the resources they need to be good lawyers, to be able to advocate for the issues that impact their clients, but to also take care of their own mental health and wellbeing.
Shiva Karimi: As a woman lawyer, as a woman of color, how was it different for you than it may have been for other lawyers?
Mahsa Khanbabai: Yeah, a huge difference. I think as a society, after what happened to George Floyd, and with the initiatives for DEI, we’ve really come to realize how many communities of color really don’t feel like they belong.
I remember feeling like an outsider at times, not only for not having gone to school in Massachusetts but also, having an Iranian sounding name that nobody could pronounce and then just starting my own practice and people wondering, well, I don’t know who she is, how do I know if I can trust her to refer clients to?
I think Boston is somewhat of an insular legal community but it’s changing. It’s been getting better, and part of it is because of our affinity bar associations. Welcoming them into the broader BBA community is one way to make sure that leadership reflects us all.
Shiva Karimi: Can you conclude by telling us what advice you have for female lawyers, especially new lawyers admitted to the bar?
Mahsa Khanbabai: Be fearless. Being an immigrant from Iran, I had always wanted to lay low, as is the case with most immigrants. I wanted to fit in and not cause any waves. Looking back now, 25 years later and in my 50s, I’m like, what was wrong with me? You should be bold and stand up for what you believe in and not feel shy about your ideas, about your perspectives, about what you need and what your clients need.
Speak up. Because most times, you’re going to find out that many other people feel the same way, and they’re also afraid or nervous or shy about saying something. But once one person speaks up, then everyone realizes, oh, I feel the same way. I have those same concerns. So definitely be bold, be fearless. One of my friends actually got me a bracelet that says, “Be Fearless.” And so, at times when I have a really difficult case, I wear that bracelet to remind myself that it’s okay to speak up and say something, no matter how difficult it might be, how controversial it might seem.
