Success Story: Overcoming Denial – A Strategic Appeal Secured Our Client’s NIW Approval and Reinstalled the Priority Date

Case Summary:

At North America Immigration Law Group, we are dedicated to standing by our clients—even in the face of difficult denials. This recent success story showcases how our strategic appeal secured a client’s NIW I-140 approval and reinstated their priority date, reaffirming the strength of their case and our legal approach.

Case Background

In October 2023, we filed a National Interest Waiver (NIW) petition under INA § 203(b)(2) for a client in the field of inorganic and environmental chemistry. The client’s proposed endeavor focused on developing nanostructured materials to remove emerging contaminants from water, including microplastics and radionuclides, with applications also extending to desalination and renewable energy—areas of growing concern for public health and the environment.

To support the petition, we submitted extensive documentation demonstrating the client’s contributions, including authored books, numerous peer-reviewed publications, and a consistent track record of peer review service. We clearly articulated how the client’s work met all three Dhanasar prongs: national importance, strong positioning to advance the endeavor, and benefit of waiving the labor certification requirement.

RFE and Denial

On February 2, 2024, USCIS issued a Request for Evidence (RFE), questioning the national importance and whether the client was well-positioned. We responded with strengthened documentation and updated expert letters, directly addressing the officer’s concerns. Despite this, USCIS denied the case on May 22, 2024. The denial was issued by Officer XM2148 and contained flawed reasoning. The officer minimized the value of the client’s publication and citation record, dismissed recommendation letters for lacking “corroborating facts,” and improperly emphasized economic impact under the first prong – contrary to USCIS guidance.

Appeal and Victory

We filed an I-290B appeal to the Administrative Appeals Office (AAO) on June 11, 2024, meticulously arguing that the denial was legally and factually erroneous. Our appeal highlighted the officer’s misapplication of the Dhanasar framework and unsupported dismissal of critical evidence. We emphasized that the officer’s standard would not have even met the benchmark set by the petitioner in Dhanasar.

On November 18, 2024, the AAO sustained our appeal, fully overturning the officer’s findings. USCIS issued the final approval on March 20, 2025—validating both the strength of the client’s qualifications and the legal accuracy of our strategy.

Our General Strategy After a Denial

While every case is unique, our firm typically recommends pursuing both an appeal and a refile for denied NIW cases. There are three primary reasons for this two-pronged approach:

Preservation of the Priority Date: If the appeal is sustained, the original priority date is reinstated, which can be crucial under retrogressed visa bulletin conditions.
No Additional Attorney Fee: For clients under our Approval or Refund® service, we handle the appeal and refile at no additional attorney fee
Filing Fee Support: We also cover the USCIS filing fee for one of the two filings—either the appeal or the refile—further easing the burden for our clients.

This strategy allows us to respond to adjudication trends while safeguarding clients’ immigration timelines. We are proud to support our clients through every stage of the process, and this case exemplifies how perseverance, experience, and legal precision can turn a setback into a success.

1. Appealing the I-140 Denial to AAO (The Administrative Appeals Office (AAO)

Filing an appeal allows us to formally challenge the denial and seek to have the decision overturned. If the appeal is successful, your original I-140 will be approved, and you will retain your original priority date—a significant advantage given current visa bulletin trends.
While AAO appeals for NIW cases historically have low approval rates (combined sustain and remand rates have ranged from 8.1% to 25% over the past five years, with 12.6% in FY2023 per USCIS data), our office has achieved significantly better outcomes. In FY2023, our NIW appeals under the “approval or refund” service had a 64.24% success rate, including both sustained decisions and approvals after remand.

As previously mentioned, we recently succeeded in overturning an NIW denial where the officer improperly focused too narrowly on economic impact under Prong 1—despite USCIS guidance that economic benefit is only one possible form of national importance, not a requirement. This demonstrates our ability to spot and effectively challenge flawed reasoning in USCIS decisions.

2. Refiling a New I-140 Petition:

We can also prepare to file a new I-140 petition. This serves as a safety net, ensuring that if the appeal does not result in a favorable outcome, we have proactively taken steps to maintain your path to permanent residency without substantial delays. The approval chance of a newly filed case is much higher than an appeal. Based on the USCIS data, the overall NIW approval rate for Fiscal Year 2023 is approximately 79.6%. For more information, please see here. Based on our own cases, refiled NIW cases have a 100% approval rate in FY2023.

In the refile, we strongly recommend avoiding premium processing if possible. Based on our extensive experience, premium processing significantly increases the risk of receiving an RFE or denial. This is often because adjudicating officers under strict 45-day deadlines may not have sufficient time to thoroughly review complex evidence and instead rely heavily on pre-written templates. This can lead to oversimplified or boilerplate reasoning, even in well-documented cases.

North America Immigration Law Group (Chen Immigration Law Associates) is a U.S. immigration law firm dedicated to representing corporations, research institutions, and individuals from all 50 U.S. states regarding I-140 immigration petitions. We specialize in employment-based immigration petition and have a proven record of high success rate for the categories of: EB2-NIW (National Interest Waiver), EB1-A (Alien of Extraordinary Ability), EB1-B (Outstanding Researcher/Professor) and O-1 (Alien of Extraordinary Ability).

Our Ten Thousand I-140 Approvals Provide Unprecedented Insight into the USCIS Adjudication Trend

With more than 58,000 EB-1A, EB-1B, EB-2 NIW and O-1 cases approved, we have first hand information on the manner in which the USCIS adjudicate I-140 cases. As the USCIS has constantly changed its adjudication standards for the EB-1A, EB-1B and EB-2 NIW categories, our firm's huge database of successful cases gives you unprecedented insight to USCIS adjudication trends. We carefully analyze the data for all of our cases and apply the results of our analyses toward giving our clients up-to-date advice and adapting our strategies such that we remain on par with the ever-shifting landscape of immigration law in the U.S. With us, you will always have access to important updates, strategies, and information so that you can make the most informed decisions about your case.

We Have Helped Hundreds and Thousands of Clients with Credentials and Backgrounds Similar to Yours

With our exceedingly large number of successful petitions, no matter what credentials you have, no matter your background and field of expertise, no matter your visa status or nationality, chances are we have helped hundreds or even thousands of clients just like you. Our clients are usually impressed with how well we understand their research and work. Our insight and understanding stems from the fact that we have handled many cases with elements similar to yours already, and this helps us devise the best strategies for each individual petition.

Vast Majority of Clients Came to Us Because of Referrals

For years, our firm has attracted new clients based solely on word of mouth, recommendations, and the positive collaboration experiences shared with them by their friends and family. We take pride in our reputation and work hard to ensure that we provide a green card application experience that our clients are happy to share with their friends and colleagues. That is how our cumulative total of approved cases grew from 600 in 2013 to over 58,000 in 2025.