Case record, EB-2 NIW
The approval turned on the waiver argument
This one is worth writing up because it shows where an EB-2 NIW is actually decided, and it is not where most people spend their effort.
Joe Kwon, Attorney, Joe Kwon Law
- Category
- EB-2 NIW (I-140)
- How it arrived
- Self-petition, no employer sponsor
- Where it stands
- I-140 approved, at consular processing as of August 2026
Client-identifying detail has been removed.
Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome. Every case turns on its own facts, its own evidence, and the law in effect when it is decided.
The acronyms first
EB means employment-based. NIW is a national interest waiver. An EB-2 green card normally needs three things: a U.S. employer, a job offer, and PERM labor certification, which is the Department of Labor process where an employer shows no qualified U.S. worker was available for the role. In an NIW you ask the government to waive the offer and the labor certification both, because the work benefits the country enough that the usual gate should not apply.
That word, waiver, is the case. Showing that you are good at what you do is not the finish line. You have to explain why it is better for the country to skip a step it normally insists on.
The client, in the only terms I can use
An applied researcher, petitioning on their own record with no employer behind it. The field, the institution and the country are not on this page. They are also not what decided the case, which is the more interesting fact.
What I filed
An I-140 petition with a full legal brief. A credential evaluation establishing that the foreign degree was equivalent to a U.S. doctorate in the field. The research record: publications, citation evidence, and peer-review responsibilities. Premium processing, which is the extra government fee that puts the petition on a shortened adjudication clock once it is accepted.
The letters did more work than anything else in the package, and specifically the independent ones. A letter from your own supervisor is legitimate and it counts. A letter from someone who knows your work only because they read it carries far more weight with an officer, because that person has no reason to be generous.
What actually decided it
National importance, stated specifically. I did not argue that the field matters. I connected this person's own work to an outcome the officer already treats as a U.S. problem worth solving. A general claim about an important field gives an officer nothing to agree with.
Evidence that the work would continue. Not potential. A standing research position, a publication record with citations behind it, and review responsibilities the field had already handed over. Well Positioned to Advance the Proposed Endeavor is a present-tense test, and the way you answer it is by showing what the field already does with this person, not what the person intends to do next.
And the waiver argument itself. Most petitions treat it as a closing formality. I have spent years inside PERM labor certification on the employer side, and labor certification is the exact step an NIW asks the government to skip. Knowing what that process accomplishes, and what it does not, is what lets you say in specific terms why skipping it serves the country here. An argument written by someone who has run the process reads differently from one copied out of a template, and officers have already read thousands of the copied kind.
Where the record ends
USCIS approved the I-140 in the EB-2 national interest waiver classification and sent the file to the National Visa Center, the State Department office that takes an approved petition through to an immigrant visa interview. As of August 2026, the client is in consular processing.
That is where this record ends.
Why a case record is not a prediction
Immigration benefits are decided by government officers who apply the law to the record in front of them, and many of them are discretionary. No attorney can promise you an approval, and anyone who does is telling you what you want to hear. What good lawyering controls is whether your case is complete, specific, and internally consistent, so that approving it is the officer's easiest path.
The information here is general and educational. It is not legal advice, and it is not a prediction or a promise about any case.
Your record is not any of these.
Which is exactly why the conversation comes before the filing. A consultation is where I tell you what your own record actually shows, including the parts you will not want to hear.