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, a Brazilian national, initially proposed to manage and expand his cleaning service business in Florida, but later submitted a business plan to instead develop a retail supermarket selling American, Brazilian, and Spanish products.
Field: business/entrepreneurship (cleaning service; later grocery store) · Read the decision (uscis.gov)
EB-2 threshold — not met
Petitioner claimed exceptional ability in business as an entrepreneur but failed to satisfy at least three of six regulatory criteria; found to satisfy only the academic degree criterion, failing the ten-years-experience and license/certification criteria.
How the evidence was treated
- degree · credited
- resume experience · discounted
“These varied activities are not all the same occupation described in the petition.”
AAO decision text - certification membership · discounted
“The Petitioner has not submitted information about the requirements to obtain documentation of the type he has submitted.”
AAO decision text - business plan · discounted
“The new proposed endeavor, therefore, represents a very substantial material change to a factor that is fundamental to the petition.”
AAO decision text
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Notable
The AAO never reached the Dhanasar national interest waiver prongs because the Petitioner failed to establish threshold EB-2 exceptional ability eligibility; the AAO noted (outside the Dhanasar analysis) that the Petitioner had impermissibly changed his proposed endeavor from a cleaning business to a grocery store business plan in response to the RFE, citing Matter of Izummi's material-change doctrine, though this was not formally coded as a prong failure since prongs were never analyzed.
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)
- 8 C.F.R. 204.5(k)(3)(ii)
- 8 C.F.R. 204.5(k)(3)(iii)
- Flores v. Garland
- Kazarian v. USCIS
- Matter of Izummi
- Matter of L-A-C-
Cases in adjacent profiles
- The Beneficiary proposed to establish an asset investment management and compliance advisory firm in New York offering c
- The Petitioner proposed to develop and commercialize zeolite-based products in the United States, including agricultural
- The Petitioner proposed to operate a medical billing and healthcare revenue cycle management firm in the United States,
- The Petitioner proposed to establish and lead as CEO a cybersecurity and crisis management company in Florida, offering
- The Petitioner proposed to establish and operate an IT consultancy company in Michigan providing cloud migration, cybers