The Petitioner seeks on behalf of the Beneficiary, a data scientist, employment-based second preference (EB-2) immigrant classification as a member of the professions holding an advanced degree, as well as a national interest waiver of the job offer requirement attached to this classification. See section 203(b )(2) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (the Act), 8 U.S.C. § 1153(b )(2). SCOPS denied the petition, concluding the Petitioner did not establish a waiver of the required job offer, and thus of the labor certification, would be in the national interest. The matter is now before us on appeal pursuant to 8 C.F.R. § 103.3.
The Petitioner bears the burden of proof to demonstrate eligibility by a preponderance of the evidence. Matter ofChawathe, 25 I&N Dec. 369, 375-76 (AAO 2010). We review the questions in this matter de novo. Matter of Christa's, Inc., 26 I&N Dec. 537,537 n.2 (AAO 2015). Upon de novo review, we will dismiss the appeal.
Law
To qualify for the underlying EB-2 visa classification, a petitioner must establish the beneficiary is an advanced degree professional or an individual of exceptional ability in the sciences, arts, or business. Section 203(b)(2)(A) of the Act.
If a petitioner establishes the beneficiary's eligibility for the underlying EB-2 classification, the petitioner must then demonstrate that the beneficiary merits a discretionary waiver of the job offer requirement "in the national interest." Section 203(b)(2)(B)(i) of the Act. Matter of Dhanasar, 26 l&N Dec. 884, 889 (AAO 2016), provides the framework for adjudicating national interest waiver petitions. Dhanasar states that U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) may, as matter of discretion, 1 grant a national interest waiver if the petitioner demonstrates that:
- The proposed endeavor has both substantial merit and national importance;
- The individual is well-positioned to advance their proposed endeavor; and
- On balance, waiving the job offer requirement would benefit the United States.
Matter ofDhanasar, 26 I&N Dec. at 889.
Analysis
The Beneficiary, a citizen of Canada, obtained the foreign equivalent of a doctorate degree in civil engineering from the._______________. in Canada in 2017. He was granted non-immigrant TN status in 2022 and is currently in Hl-B status. According to a letter from the Petitioner, the Beneficiary has been in the employ of the Petitioner in the United States as a data scientist since November 2022. The Beneficiary's proposed endeavor is developing a self-planning, self-executing multimodal multi-agent generative artificial intelligence (AI) system that provides Petitioner's customers with intelligent recommendations for their cloud infrastructure optimization. The Petitioner submitted the Beneficiary's academic record, personal statements, and publications, as well as, an expert letter, support letters, Petitioner's company documents, and media articles in support of the petition.2
SCOPS determined the Beneficiary qualified for the underlying EB-2 visa classification as an advanced degree professional and we agree. However, SCOPS found the Petitioner had not established any ofDhanasar 's prongs to demonstrate the Beneficiary merits a discretionary waiver of the job offer requirement "in the national interest." On appeal, the Petitioner provides a brief and two exhibits. According to the Petitioner, SCOPS erred as a matter of fact and law in its analysis. Dhanasar 's first prong, substantial merit and national impmiance, focuses on the specific endeavor that the individual proposes to undertake. Matter ofDhanasar, 26 I&N Dec. at 889. The endeavor's substantial merit may be demonstrated in a range of areas such as business, entrepreneurialism, science, technology, culture, health, or education. Id. SCOPS determined the Beneficiaiy's proposed endeavor did not have substantial merit because the benefits of the endeavor would be limited to the Petitioner. However, endeavors related to research, pure science, and the furtherance of human knowledge may qualify, whether or not the potential accomplishments in those fields are likely to translate into economic benefits for the United States. See generally 6 USCIS Policy Manual F.5(D)(3), https://www.uscis.gov/policy-manual (providing, as guidance, factors to consider in determining substantial merit). Here, the Petitioner has demonstrated through, for example, his personal statement, articles, and letters, that his endeavor would advance AI, a critical and emerging technology, and therefore falls within one or more of the areas contemplated by Dhanasar. In determining whether the proposed endeavor has national importance, we consider its potential prospective impact. Matter of Dhanasar, 26 I&N Dec. at 889. In Dhanasar, we noted that, in assessing national impmiance, "we look for broader implications" of the proposed endeavor and that "[a]n undertaking may have national importance for example, because it has national or even global implications within a particular field." Id at 890. We also stated that "[a]n endeavor that has 2 While we do not mention all the evidence submitted in support of the petition, we have reviewed the entire record. p. 3 significant potential to employ U.S. workers or has other substantial positive economic effects, particularly in an economically depressed area, for instance, may well be understood to have national importance." Id.
With respect to national importance, SCOPS properly analyzed the evidence and determined, in relevant part, that merely working in a science, technology, engineering, or mathematics field does not in and of itself establish national importance. See id. at 889 (in determining national importance, the relevant question is not the importance of the industry or profession in which the individual will work; instead, we focus on "the specific endeavor that the foreign national proposes to undertake"). SCOPS' decision also found that the proposed endeavor stands to primarily benefit the Petitioner. We agree and add that benefits to a specific employer alone, even an employer with a national footprint, are not sufficiently relevant to the question of whether a person's endeavor has national importance. See generally 6 USCIS Policy Manual, supra, at F.5(D)(3).
On appeal, the Petitioner asserts that the Beneficiary's contributions will reach far beyond it and refers to its expert opinion and support letters submitted below as demonstrating the national importance of the Beneficiary's endeavor. The Petitioner argues that pursuant to Matter ofSkirball, 25 I&N Dec. 799 ( AAO 2012), because SCOPS did not question the qualifications ofthe expert, then it should not have rejected the expert testimony. However, SCOPS reviewed the expert opinion and supporting letters and did not reject any of the testimony provided by the authors of the letters. Rather, SCOPS determined the letters did not corroborate the Petitioner's claims regarding the national importance of the Beneficiary's proposed endeavor and weighed them accordingly for this reason. The Petitioner also quoted one of our non-precedent decisions as support for placing "considerable weight" on an expert opinion. However, because the decision was not published as precedent, it does not bind us in future adjudications. See 8 C.F.R. § 103.3( c ). Further, to determine whether a petitioner has met its burden under the preponderance standard, we consider not only the quantity, but also the quality, including relevance, probative value, and credibility, of the evidence. Matter ofChawathe, 25 I&N Dec. at 375-76; Matter ofE-M-, 20 I&N Dec. 77, 79-80 (Comm'r 1989). Based on our de novo review of the record, the Petitioner has not established the national importance of the Beneficiary's proposed endeavor by a preponderance of the evidence.
Addressing the evidence highlighted by the Petitioner, the above referenced support letters speak to the Beneficiary's knowledge, skills and past accomplishments in research, which relate to the second prong of the Dhanasar framework. See Matter ofDhanasar, 26 I&N Dec. at 890 (Dhanasar 's second prong "shifts the focus from the proposed endeavor to the foreign national.") The issue here is whether the specific endeavor that the Beneficiary proposes to undertake has national importance under Dhanasar 's first prong. Further, the expert opinion dated December 2024 "assess[es] the industry impact and national importance of the endeavors of [ the Petitioner's] employees" and does not discuss the Beneficiary's specific proposed endeavor, speaking rather to the contributions of the Petitioner. According to the Petitioner, however, its expert letter discussed the Petitioner's technological endeavors in depth as well as its application to the public and private sector at large, such as its AI framework and how that has impacted the business in multiple facets, thereby touching upon the Beneficiary's proposed endeavor. However, because the Petitioner's technological endeavors may "touch" upon the Beneficiary's proposed endeavor does not establish the Beneficiary's proposed endeavor is nationally important. Rather, the Petitioner must establish how the specific functions and tasks carried out by the Beneficiary in his proposed endeavor affect the Petitioner's business such that p. 4 it would broadly impact the field or have "significant potential to employ U.S. workers" or "other substantial positive economic effects, particularly in an economically depressed area." Id. at 889-90. Here, neither the expert letter nor the remaining record provides details of how the Beneficiary's role within the Petitioner would have such broad impact as contemplated by Dhanasar.
We have also reviewed the letters by the Petitioner's employees, who discuss the Beneficiary's contributions to his team. In a December 2023 letter, his manager described, for example, how the Beneficiary played a role in developing an AI based assistant tool that reduced the manual time of the Petitioner's operation team's work and another tool that "will be" valuable to the operation team's daily tasks. However, the letters do not establish how these contributions to the team or the prospective impact of the Beneficiary's work would rise to the level of national importance. Another letter dated May 2025 from a different manager speaks to how the impact of Beneficiary's endeavor "can" go beyond the Petitioner by contributing to the broader AI and machine learning field. The manager stated that the Beneficiary is working on techniques such as "advancing the development of complex multimodal generative AT systems, particularly focusing on generating cloud optimization recommendations" and these techniques "can potentially be applied to a wide range of use cases such as healthcare and finance." However, the Petitioner does not sufficiently demonstrate that the work the Beneficiary performs for it will be shared with the field to have a significant impact beyond its customers. Id at 890. For example, the manager does not describe how the proposed endeavor would be shared and only discusses the Beneficiary's team's research being featured in internal conferences. For the above reasons, the Petitioner has not established the national importance of the Beneficiary's proposed endeavor. As the identified reasons for dismissal are dispositive of the appeal, we decline to reach and hereby reserve the remaining arguments raised by the Petitioner concerning the Beneficiary's eligibility under Dhanasar 's second and third prongs. See INS v. Bagamasbad, 429 U.S. 24, 25 (1976) (stating that agencies are not required to make "purely advisory findings" on issues that are unnecessary to the ultimate decision); see also Matter ofL-A-C-, 26 I&N Dec. 516, 526 n. 7 (BIA 2015) ( declining to reach alternative issues on appeal where an applicant is otherwise ineligible).
Conclusion
As the Petitioner has not established the requisite first prong of Dhanasar 's analytical framework, it consequently has not established that the Beneficiary is eligible for or otherwise merits a national interest waiver as a matter of discretion.
ORDER: The appeal is dismissed.
NOTICE: This constitutes the final decision in this matter. The filing of a motion will not postpone the effect of the decision. 8 C.F.R. § 103.5(a)(l)(iv). Aliens who are not lawfully present, or who are otherwise inadmissible or deportable, may be subject to the commencement of removal proceedings under section 240 ofthe Act through the issuance ofa Form I-862, Notice to Appear. Those proceedings may result in their removal from the United States and possible ineligibility for future visas or other immigration benefits.