Interim Decision #3363
make a showing significantly above that necessary to prove the “prospective national
benefit” [required of aliens seeking to qualify as “exceptional.”] The burden will rest
with the alien to establish that exemption from, or waiver of, the job offer will be in
the national interest. Each case is to be judged on its own merits.
Several factors must be considered when evaluating a request for a
national interest waiver. First, it must be shown that the alien seeks employ-
ment in an area of substantial intrinsic merit. This beneficiary’s field of
endeavor, engineering of bridges, clearly satisfies this first threshold. The
importance of bridges, and their proper maintenance, is immediately appar-
ent. It must be stressed, however, that eligibility is not established solely by
a showing that the beneficiary’s field of endeavor has intrinsic merit. A peti-
tioner cannot establish qualification for a national interest waiver based
solely on the importance of the alien’s occupation. It is the position of the
Service to grant national interest waivers on a case by case basis, rather than
to establish blanket waivers for entire fields of specialization.
Next, it must be shown that the proposed benefit will be national in
scope. While the alien’s employment may be limited to a particular geo-
graphic area, New York’s bridges and roads connect the state to the nation-
al transportation system. The proper maintenance and operation of these
bridges and roads therefore serve the interests of other regions of the coun-
try. Moreover, nothing in the record indicates that proper maintenance of
New York’s transportation infrastructure would have an adverse impact on
the interests of other regions.
2
We therefore conclude that the occupation in
this case serves the national interest.
3
The final threshold is therefore specific to the alien. The petitioner
seeking the waiver must persuasively demonstrate that the national interest
would be adversely affected if a labor certification were required for the
alien. The petitioner must demonstrate that it would be contrary to the
national interest to potentially deprive the prospective employer of the serv-
217
2
There may be cases where the benefit is not only purely local, but may even be harm-
ful to the national interest. For example, the construction of a dam may benefit one area while
cutting off a crucial water supply to another area.
3
In reaching this conclusion, we note that the analysis we follow in “national interest”
cases under section 203(b)(2)(B) of the Act differs from that for standard “exceptional abili-
ty” cases under section 203(b)(2)(A) of the Act. In the latter type of case, the local labor mar-
ket is considered through the labor certification process and the activity performed by the
alien need not have a national effect. For instance, pro bono legal services as a whole serve
the national interest, but the impact of an individual attorney working pro bono would be so
attenuated at the national level as to be negligible. Similarly, while education is in the nation-
al interest, the impact of a single schoolteacher in one elementary school would not be in the
national interest for purposes of waiving the job offer requirement of section 203(b)(2)(B) of
the Act. As another example, while nutrition has obvious intrinsic value, the work of one cook
in one restaurant could not be considered sufficiently in the national interest for purposes of
this provision of the Act.