Case parameters
Filing: October 2025
Decision: December 31, 2025
Criteria claimed: 6
Timing: 14 business days to RFE
How it all happened
Hi everyone! Happy New Year to all! Yesterday morning, December 31, I received an email notification that my case was approved, and a few hours later the online status on the USCIS website changed. At the end of 2023 I filed for O-1A (from the US), without premium processing, and got Approved in 4 months. In October 2025 I filed an EB-1A case with premium processing and received an RFE on the 14th business day. Specialization: Business Development in e-commerce & retail. The case was about 700 pages (including attachments). Of the 6 criteria submitted (judging, membership in an association, media about me, my articles, salary, and a leading role in the organization), adjudicator XM2121 counted only 2 — membership in the association ECDMA and judging at competitions Plus Awards, Young Entrepreneur of the Russian Federation (from Rosmolodezh (Росмолодежи)), and assessments by directors/managers in one of the organizations where I previously worked. The officer read my case quite carefully, got into the details, googled information and fairly argued why certain criteria could not be credited. I decided not to respond to the criteria: media about me and my articles, because objectively they didn’t meet the requirements (articles about me were authored by me, and articles in trade/professional journals were not scholarly).
I focused on the criteria: leading role and salary — and added a much more detailed and cohesive section called “Final Merits” and my future plans to work in the US (an offer from one retail company that plans dynamic growth + a company in marketing and e‑commerce with which I interacted while on O-1A status). The RFE response memorandum turned out to be 30 pages + 240 pages of attachments. I decided to print the response in color so the officer could see all the underlines and highlights I made. I wrote and signed the translator’s certificate myself and attached it at the beginning of the response. I translated website pages using machine translation. I proved the leading role (not a critical role) via the employment contract; a hand-drawn organizational chart highlighting my position and influence; letters from former CEOs of companies where I worked, from the head of HR, from colleagues I previously worked with who now hold significant positions at other companies (all of them can be Googled); information about the size and standing of the companies I worked for via rankings from Forbes, Deloitte, Data Insight, etc. I proved salary via the employment contract, 2-NDFL (2-НДФЛ) statements, payroll bank account statements (for 2 years), a reference from SuperJob.ru and salary statistics for my position on SalaryExpert. I rewrote the RFE answer about four times. I had it analyzed by ChatGPT, my son, and a US citizen. I think that also helped: when people who are not specialists read your case they either understand the logic or they don’t — the same will happen with the officer when they read it… Patience and strength to everyone on the journey. It’s not easy, but it’s possible! Many sincere thanks to Egor @e_akimov and all the guys who support this community. I periodically
Author of the story
Dmitry Kuzmin (@dimanatrave), from the chat @talentvisahelp. Original message in the chat.
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