AAO dismissed an EB-1C appeal for a wholesale grocery and dry cleaning company, finding the petitioner could not prove…

The petitioner, a Florida-based company claiming to operate wholesale grocery/import-export and dry cleaning businesses, sought to permanently transfer a foreign national as its general manager under the EB-1C multinational executive or manager classification. On de novo review, the AAO found that while some deficiencies identified by the Director were cured on appeal (ability to pay, one year of doing business, and the beneficiary's prior executive capacity abroad), two fatal issues remained: the petitioner failed to prove a qualifying ownership relationship with the foreign parent through three inconsistent versions of the same stock certificate and no evidence of payment for shares, and failed to show the beneficiary would actually perform managerial or executive duties given vague job descriptions, a small and inconsistently described workforce, and the beneficiary's own admission of ignorance about basic business operations. Additionally, the AAO affirmed the Director's finding that the petitioner had willfully misrepresented material facts — including the nature and location of its business, its ownership structure, and the beneficiary's role — through conflicting statements and manufactured documents across multiple rounds of filings. The AAO did, however, withdraw the misrepresentation finding as to the beneficiary individually.

What worked: On appeal, the petitioner successfully demonstrated its ability to pay the proffered wage through corrected tax and payroll filings, established that it had been in business for one year prior to filing, and provided sufficient evidence that the beneficiary had worked in an executive capacity for the claimed foreign parent company abroad.

What failed: The petitioner could not establish a qualifying corporate relationship because three inconsistent versions of the same stock certificate and changing IRS ownership disclosures undermined credibility, and no evidence of actual payment for shares was provided. The petitioner also failed to show the beneficiary would work in a genuine managerial or executive capacity, given vague and generic duty descriptions, an understaffed organization with no clear subordinate management layer, and the beneficiary's own sworn admissions of ignorance about basic company operations. The AAO also found that the petitioner's repeated, escalating misrepresentations — including manufactured invoices and changing business descriptions — constituted willful material misrepresentation.

Takeaway: EB-1C petitioners must maintain scrupulous consistency in corporate ownership documents, payroll records, and job duty descriptions from the initial filing through adjudication, as contradictions across submissions are treated as misrepresentation rather than mere negligence. Employers should ensure the beneficiary has demonstrable, documented involvement in managing the U.S. operation and that subordinate employees genuinely perform supervisory or professional functions — not just operational tasks.

Cases like this are frequently used by attorneys when responding to RFEs or building initial petitions. The evidence patterns that worked (or failed) here directly reflect what USCIS officers look for when evaluating EB-1C criteria.