I am honored to be speaking about EB-2 National Interest Waiver (NIW) cases at the annual American Immigration Lawyers Association Northwest CLE.  This annual event put on by the Washington and Oregon AILA Chapters will be held at Seattle University on March 17 and 18.  Along with my colleagues, Amy Royalty and Ursula Owen, we will be discussing the crème de la creme employment based categories: EB-1-1 extraordinary ability workers, EB-1-1 outstanding researchers and professors, EB-1-3 multinational managers, and EB-2 advanced degree and exceptional ability workers eligible for NIW waivers of the labor certification or PERM requirement (labor market test).  In order to avoid PERM in NIW cases, the applicant (or sponsoring petitioner) must show that the foreign national’s work is in a field of “intrinsic merit,”  the benefit of the work is “national in scope,” and it is in the national interest to waive PERM. Or, stated otherwise, it is not in the national interest to require labor market testing. To show this, the applicant/employer must show that the foreign worker has had “some impact” on the field and that he/she has contributed to the field at a level substantially greater than that by similarly qualified workers.  Most of the difficulty in these cases centers on that third prong. I really enjoy working on EB-2 cases in particular because they are interesting and challenging, and because of the important role our clients play in their respective fields.