dismissed H-1B Case: Data Analysis

U.S. Citizenship 
and Immigration 
Services 
Non-Precedent Decision of the
Administrative Appeals Office 
Date: JULY 24, 2024 In Re: 32389618 
Appeal of Texas Service Center Decision 
Form 1-129, Petition for Nonimmigrant Worker (H-lB) 
The Petitioner seeks to amend the Beneficiary's temporary employment under the H-lB nonimmigrant 
classification for specialty occupations. See Immigration and Nationality Act (the Act) section 
101(a)(15)(H)(i)(b), 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(15)(H)(i)(b). The H-lB program allows a U.S. employer to 
temporarily employ a qualified foreign worker in a position that requires both: (a) the theoretical and 
practical application of a body of highly specialized knowledge; and (b) the attainment of a bachelor's 
or higher degree in the specific specialty (or its equivalent) as a minimum prerequisite for entry into 
the position. 
The Texas Service Center Director initially approved the Form 1-129, Petition for a Nonimmigrant 
Worker (petition), then revoked the approval after issuing a notice of intent to revoke (NOIR). The 
Director revoked the approval on one basis: Because the Beneficiary was no longer employed in the 
capacity specified in the petition. The matter is now before us on appeal. The Petitioner bears the 
burden of proof to demonstrate eligibility by a preponderance of the evidence. Section 291 of the Act; 
Matter of Chawathe, 25 l&N Dec. 369, 375 (AAO 2010). We review the questions in this matter de 
novo. Matter ofChristo 's Inc., 26 l&N Dec. 537, 537 n.2 (AAO 2015). Upon de novo review, we 
will dismiss the appeal. 
I. LEGAL FRAMEWORK 
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) may revoke the approval of an H-lB petition 
pursuant to 8 C.F.R. § 214.2(h)(l l)(iii), which states the following: 
(A) Grounds for revocation . The director shall send to the petitioner a notice of 
intent to revoke the petition in relevant part if he or she finds that: 
(1) The beneficiary is no longer employed by the petitioner in the capacity 
specified in the petition . .. ; or 
(2) The statement of facts contained in the petition or on the 
application for a temporary labor certification was not true and 
correct, inaccurate, fraudulent, or misrepresented a material fact; 
or 
(3) The petitioner violated terms and conditions of the approved 
petition; or 
(4) The petitioner violated requirements of section 101 ( a )(1 S)(H) of 
the Act or paragraph (h) of this section; or 
(5) The approval of the petition violated paragraph (h) of this section 
or involved gross error. 
(B) Notice and decision. The notice of intent to revoke shall contain a detailed 
statement of the grounds for the revocation and the time period allowed for 
the petitioner's rebuttal. The petitioner may submit evidence in rebuttal within 
30 days of receipt of the notice. The director shall consider all relevant 
evidence presented in deciding whether to revoke the petition in whole or in 
part .... 
II. BACKGROUND 
The Petitioner's business place was in I I Tennessee, but indicated the location where the 
Beneficiary would perform the specialty occupation work was in I I Tennessee. The 
Petitioner indicated the Beneficiary's duties would include, but not be limited to the following: 
• Collaborate with business analysts and the business to develop interactive and engaging 
visualizations to highlight trends in the data in an iterative development environment; 
• Work with Business Analysts to understand user reporting requirements and query source 
system databases which could be in one of Oracle, SQL Developer, MySQL Databases like 
Mon go DB or using Big Data technologies like Hadoop, Hive or Spark and validate if the same 
data is replicated in the Pivotal Greenplum Data Lake; 
• If data doesn't already exist in the Data Lake, work with the Ingestion team to get it ingested 
by mapping the data structures between the source and its target tables in the lake and write 
necessary transformations for doing it. Once the data got ingested, we can pull the data into 
the reporting tools; 
• Understand reporting requirements and design final tables that can be easily consumed by 
reporting tools like Spotfire, Tableau and Microsoft Power BI; 
• Use required Information Links in TIBCO Spotfire to extract relevant data from the Pivotal 
Greenplum Data Lake; 
• Proficiency in performing EDA (Exploratory Data Analysis), Root Cause Analysis and Impact 
Analysis; 
• Experience in complete Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) involving Analysis, 
Design, Development and Testing; 
• Fixing defects and troubleshooting technical problems in mappings at various stages of testing 
such as System Integration, User acceptance and Volume testing; 
2 
• Stitch data from several Source Systems available in the Data Lake using PgAdmin or Dbeaver 
by writing complex PostgreSQL or PLSQL scripts to create views, Stored Procedures and 
Functions that clean, analyze and aggregate data; 
• Exhibit deep conceptual knowledge on Spotfire Administration and hands on experience in 
development of Spotfire Visualizations, Details on Demand, Information Designer, Library 
Administrator, ADS, In-Memory Architecture etc.; 
• Extend the default functionality of Spotfire by writing Tron Python scripts that interact with the 
underlying C# Spotfire framework; 
• Build custom web applications using the JavaScript framework Angular JS V5 that would 
integrate all existing and new Spotfire Dashboards thereby greatly enhancing the user 
experience for the business; 
• Check data for anomalies or unusual patterns that do not correctly reflect the business 
processes. Write scripts in the appropriate language using either R, Python or PostgreSQL 
Scripts to correct and reformat the data; and 
• Creating Dashboards/Reports using reporting tools like Spotfire, Tableau and Microsoft Power 
BT according to the user requirements and migrating the dashboards from Dev to Prod 
environment. 
The Director approved the petition in September of 2023. 
III. ANALYSIS 
After the Director approved the petition, USCIS performed a site visit where the agency officer 
discovered that the Beneficiary had not been working as represented on the petition, and instead he 
was updating his certifications (i.e., he was in non-productive status) for an extended period. The 
Director issued an NOIR the petition's approval ultimately because the Beneficiary was no longer 
employed in the capacity specified in the petition. After the Petitioner responded to the NOIR, the 
Director revoked the petition's approval. 
We begin elucidating that the Petitioner incorrectly characterizes the revocation's basis. The 
Petitioner alleges that the Director "states that the reason for revoking the HI B petition is that the 
Beneficiary was not working at the location stated on the Form 1-129." As we noted above, the 
Director revoked the approval because the Petitioner stated the Beneficiary would perform a particular 
type of work, but because of a lack of that type of work, the Beneficiary was no longer employed in 
the capacity specified in the petition. While the revocation notice contained an error in reflecting the 
location where the Beneficiary would work was in the Petitioner's! !office, that element was 
not a determining factor in the revocation. Instead, it was the type of work the Beneficiary was-or 
in this case was not-performing for an extended period of time. 
Regarding that minor miscue, it is not enough to demonstrate errors in an agency's decision; a 
petitioner must also establish it was prejudiced by the mistakes. Shinseki v. Sanders, 556 U.S. 396, 409 
(2009); Molina-Martinez v. United States, 578 U.S. 189, 203 (2016). As the Petitioner has not 
demonstrated it was prejudiced by the Director's error, such a lapse in propriety is harmless and is 
insufficient grounds upon which to base this appeal. Errors can be overlooked when they had no bearing 
on the substance of an agency's decision. Aguilar v. Garland, 60 F.4th401, 407 (8th Cir. 2023) (citing 
Prohibition Juice Co. v. United States Food & Drug Admin., 45 F.4th 8, 24 (D.C. Cir. 2022)). The 
3 
party that "seeks to have a judgment set aside because of an erroneous ruling carries the burden of 
showing that prejudice resulted." Shinseki, 556 U.S. at 409 (quoting Palmer v. Hoffman, 318 U.S. 
109, 116 (1943)); Molina-Martinez, 578 U.S. at 203. 
After making the above incorrect allegation, the Petitioner's appeal brief does not substantively 
address the actual basis for the revocation. In fact, their only mention of the actual basis occurs when 
the brief includes a partial quote from the revocation notice, but the petitioning organization adds 
context to the quotation that does not exist. The quote we reference follows and the incorrect context 
is the portion the Petitioner added in the brackets: 
On January 11, 2024, USCIS issued the Revocation, re-stating the Petitioner failed to 
establish that the Beneficiary was employed by the Petitioner in the capacity specified 
in the H 1B Petition, based on the FDNS Officer's site report that "revealed the 
beneficiary has been in non-productive status [because he was not working at the 
Petitioner's office]." 
Here, we correct the record and provide the full context from the Director's revocation decision: 
The site visit revealed the beneficiary has been in non-productive status. The 
signatory/management representative was aware of the petition for the beneficiary, what the 
beneficiary was to be paid and the duties of the beneficiary. However, the beneficiary has been 
in non-productive status for an extended period. 
Therefore, the petition is revoked since the beneficiary is no longer employed in the capacity 
specified in the petition. 
When comparing these two passages, it seems that the Petitioner-or their representative-elected to 
skirt around the true basis for the revocation (that the Beneficiary was in a non-productive status for 
an extended period) by focusing solely on an irrelevant aspect of where the Beneficiary would perform 
the work. These efforts conjure a legal theory that could be best "described as '[sleight] of hand' and 
'hocus-pocus."' Zuelzke Tool & Eng'g Co. v. Anderson Die Castings, Inc., 925 F.2d 226, 230 (7th 
Cir. 1991). Despite several pages of protest predicated on a fictitious basis, the Petitioner fails to 
substantively engage with the clearly stated grounds for revocation in the appeal brief. This omission 
is significant and undermines the efficacy of the Petitioner's appeal. 
IV. CONCLUSION 
The appeal will be dismissed for the above stated reasons, with each considered an independent and 
alternative basis for the decision. In visa petition proceedings, it is a petitioner's burden to establish 
eligibility for the immigration benefit sought. The Petitioner has not met that burden. 
ORDER: The appeal is dismissed. 
4