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 sought to establish a consulting business in Florida providing financial planning and business management services to the agribusiness sector.
Field: agricultural finance/agribusiness consulting · Read the decision (uscis.gov)
EB-2 threshold — addressed
Director found, and AAO did not disturb, that Petitioner qualifies as an advanced degree professional based on a foreign equivalent bachelor's degree plus five years of progressive experience.
Prong 1 — national importancenot established · dispositive
“The business plan does not provide projections for potential revenue or job creation, and states only that it will hire "an employee" to help with accounting management and coordination.”
“None of the articles relate to the Petitioner nor her proposed endeavor.”
“Although an endeavor that is regionally focused may have national importance, it must still have a broad impact.”
“We conclude that the potential to create a single job does not rise to the level of the "significant" economic effects contemplated in Matter of Dhanasar”
“Without additional evidence to establish the potential prospective impact of the proposed endeavor, the Petitioner's unsupported assertion alone is not sufficient to establish this claim.”
AAO decision text
How the evidence was treated
- business plan · discounted
“does not provide projections for potential revenue or job creation”
AAO decision text - other · discounted
“None of the articles relate to the Petitioner nor her proposed endeavor.”
AAO decision text - motion resubmission · discounted
“she largely restates arguments already presented in her initial brief and RFE response”
AAO decision text
Where this case turned
- Business plan speculative · p1 — projections without a documented basis or steps
- Economic claims unsupported · p1 — job/revenue projections with no corroborating basis
- Field importance conflated with endeavor · p1 — argues the field matters, not the specific endeavor
- Local, not national scope · p1 — impact confined to clients / a region
Notable
AAO distinguished a prior non-precedent decision cited by Petitioner (a veterans-focused consultancy case) on the basis that it lacked comparably probative expert letters, illustrating how non-precedent decisions are treated as persuasive but distinguishable.
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
- Matter of E-M-
- Matter of L-A-C-
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