dismissedAPR072025_05B52032025-04-07 · appeal · Texas Service Center
This is an AAO appeal decision — a case denied once and appealed. It shows how the framework is applied; it is not the filing population.
The Petitioner, an airline transport pilot and certified flight instructor, proposed to work as a pilot and later transition into training/instructing new pilots for a U.S. airline, asserting this would help address a national pilot shortage.
Field: aviation / commercial piloting and flight instruction · Read the decision (uscis.gov)
Prong 1 — national importancenot established · dispositive
“The Petitioner provided generic and unsupported statements regarding the asserted potential prospective national impact of his proposed endeavor.”
“it is not clear how filling one pilot position would have a national impact on this claimed national airline pilot shortage”
“a shortage of workers and his ability to fill one role does not alone establish that a proposed endeavor would likely have a prospective national impact”
“The Petitioner does not sufficiently detail and document how his work in the aviation field would be materially different from any other similarly experienced employee”
“the relevant question is not the importance of the field, industry, or profession in which a petitioner may work”
AAO decision text
How the evidence was treated
- business plan · discounted
“The Petitioner has not submitted specific and targeted business plans but provides generic assertions”
AAO decision text - resume experience · discounted
“it is not sufficient to establish the national importance of his proposed endeavor”
AAO decision text - other · discounted
“These provided numbers illustrate the size of the aviation industry as a whole leaving question as to the Petitioner's contention”
AAO decision text
Where this case turned
- Economic claims unsupported · p1 — job/revenue projections with no corroborating basis
- Endeavor too vague · p1 — described as a job role, not a defined undertaking
- Field importance conflated with endeavor · p1 — argues the field matters, not the specific endeavor
- Occupational shortage argument rejected · p1 — argues a labor shortage — the labor-certification question, not Dhanasar
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Notable
AAO agreed the endeavor had substantial merit but found no national importance, emphasizing that filling a single pilot/instructor position could not be shown to have national-level impact despite reliance on industry-wide statistics (5% of GDP, $1.8 trillion, 14,500 annual openings). AAO expressly declined to reach prongs 2 and 3 as moot.
Authorities this decision leans on
From the doctrinal survivor set — 187 authority tests across 47 distinct authorities cleared the differential-lift gates. Only those appear here.
- 8 C.F.R. 103.3
- 8 C.F.R. 204.5(k)(2)
- Flores v. Garland
- Matter of Ho
- Matter of L-A-C-
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