UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA ) MVP SPORTS, INC., ) ) Plaintiff, ) ) v. ) ) No. 19-cv-00742 (KBJ) L. FRANCIS CISSNA, Director, United ) States Citizenship and Immigration ) Services, ) ) Defendant. ) ) MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER TRANSFERRING CASE TO THE CENTRAL DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA Plaintiff MVP Sports, Inc. is an ecommerce enterprise located in California. (See Compl., ECF No. 1, ¶ 8.) On March 15, 2019, MVP Sports filed the instant action against L. Francis Cissna, the Director of the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (“USCIS”), challenging the denial of its Form I-129 petition by USCIS’s California Service Center (“CSC”). 1 (See id. ¶¶ 1, 9.) MVP Sports submitted Form I- 129 on behalf of Yue Lam Ng, and its complaint contends that the CSC’s decision must be set aside under the Administrative Procedure Act (see id. ¶ 1), because the CSC did not comply with the Immigration and Nationality Act and its accompanying regulations when making that determination (see id. ¶¶ 32, 34). MVP Sports further alleges that the 1 In essence, Form I-129 allows employers, such as MVP Sports, to sponsor foreign workers “to come to the United States temporarily to perform services or labor, or to receive training[.]” I-129, Petition for a Nonimmigrant Worker, U.S. Citizenship and Immigr. Servs. (Sept. 3, 2020), https://perma.cc/YD7Y-KBVK. Such workers are classified as “an H-1B, H-2A, H-2B, H-3, L-1, O-1, O-2, P-1, P-1S, P-2, P2S, P-3, P-3S, Q-1 or R-1 nonimmigrant worker.” Id. Employers also use Form I-129 “to request an extension of stay in or change of status to E-1, E-2, E-3, H-1B1 or TN, or one of the above classifications for an alien.” Id. CSC did not provide a reasoned explanation for its decision, and that it relied on evidence outside the record without affording MVP Sports a fair opportunity to respond to such evidence. (See id. ¶¶ 36–39.) Because MVP Sports is a California-based company challenging the decision of the CSC in California, this Court issued an order on September 8, 2020, requiring MVP Sports to show cause why its complaint should not be dismissed or transferred for improper venue under 28 U.S.C. § 1406(a). (See Order to Show Cause, ECF No. 21.) In its response, MVP Sports contends that venue is proper in this district because “the final agency action at issue, and the process the [CSC] followed to make that decision, are the result of policies and templates created by [USCIS’s] headquarters[,]” which are located in Washington, D.C. (See Resp. to Order to Show Cause, ECF No. 22, at 1–2.) 2 MVP Sports also argues that “[m]aintaining the case” in the District of Columbia would “facilitate the timely administration of justice.” (See id. at 2.) Additionally, in the event that the Court determines venue does not lie in the District of Columbia, MVP Sports asks the Court to transfer the case to the Central District of California in lieu of dismissal. (See id.) For the reasons explained ...
Original document
Source: All recent Immigration Decisions In All the U.S. Courts of Appeals