Important Notice
EB5AN and EB5 United are competitors and adverse parties in pending litigation. This article presents EB5AN’s views and summarizes allegations and positions in the case. No court has ruled on the merits. This article is not legal, financial, immigration, or investment advice.
Transparency in EB-5: An Update on the EB5AN v. EB5 United Litigation
EB5AN believes that EB-5 investors deserve complete and accurate information about the projects and fund managers competing for their capital. Project terms and economics should be disclosed plainly. Marketing should be clear and precise—it should not create confusion about who is sponsoring a project. These principles are at the heart of the pending litigation between EB5AN and one of its competitors, EB5 United.
In March 2024, EB5 United sued EB5AN in Florida state court over a due-diligence summary EB5AN had prepared about one of EB5 United’s projects, Lakefront Estates. EB5 United alleges that the summary contained false statements and that, by preparing it, EB5AN interfered with EB5 United’s business.
EB5AN denies these allegations.
The summary was prepared at the request of a single overseas marketing partner and shared with that partner alone. EB5 United’s claim that the summary was broadcast to the public is, in EB5AN’s view, patently false and intended to smear EB5AN.
More broadly, EB5AN believes EB5 United filed this lawsuit not to resolve a genuine dispute, but to harm a competitor’s business and to discourage the kind of due-diligence scrutiny EB-5 investors depend on.
The case is now in discovery. EB5AN has asked EB5 United to produce the documents at the center of the dispute and has moved to make certain EB5 United documents part of the public record. EB5 United has taken a different course. It has issued subpoenas to eighteen foreign nationals who, EB5AN believes, were prospective EB-5 investors. Each subpoena commands its recipient to appear for a sworn, video-recorded deposition.
EB5AN is sharing this update in the same spirit of transparency it expects across the industry. This post addresses how the dispute began, where the case now stands, the counterclaims EB5AN has brought, and the issues EB5AN believes are relevant to EB-5 investors.
The core pleadings from both sides are part of the public record and are linked below. Readers are encouraged to review these filings and reach their own conclusions.
Download Select Core Legal Filings
The Origins of the Dispute
EB5 United’s complaint is related to a due-diligence summary EB5AN prepared that describes Lakefront Estates, one of EB5 United’s projects. EB5 United alleges that the summary made false statements that harmed its reputation and that, by preparing the summary, EB5AN interfered with EB5 United’s business relationships.
EB5AN’s position is that the summary was competitor due diligence. It was titled “Comments,” and it combined the facts EB5AN relied on—drawn primarily from the project’s own offering documents—with EB5AN’s opinions and concerns about the Lakefront Estates project. EB5AN prepared the summary at the request of an overseas marketing partner and shared it with only that partner. EB5AN denies that it circulated the summary publicly or broadly. The summary is part of the public record and is available for review as Exhibit 1 of EB5AN’s Motion to Dismiss (starting on page 25).
EB5AN believes the summary reflects speech that is protected under the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The facts on which EB5AN based its opinions were set out in the summary itself—and those facts were available to the recipient through EB5 United’s own offering materials.
The summary posed a series of diligence questions that an investor or advisor could verify from the project’s own materials, including:
- How the property’s stated value was determined;
- Whether the EB-5 loan held, or would retain, the senior position that the marketing implied;
- How Lakefront Estates’ third-party regional center fee structure might affect investors;
- How the EB-5 fund’s structure and management fees would likely affect investors;
- What the terms of the I-526E approval refund guaranty and the completion guaranty might mean in practice;
- How the project’s location and target market would affect sales; and
- How prior litigation involving the regional center and the project could affect investors.
These are the kinds of questions EB5AN believes any investor should be free to ask about any EB-5 project.
Inside Discovery: Two Very Different Approaches. EB5AN Asks for Documents; EB5 United Subpoenas Potential EB-5 Investors.
EB5AN and EB5 United are now in discovery, the court-supervised process in which each side exchanges the evidence relevant to the case. EB5AN has sought relevant documents from EB5 United in the ordinary course of that process.
After reviewing EB5 United’s initial production of documents, EB5AN believes EB5 United may still have relevant materials that have not yet been produced—some of which are referenced in what has already been produced. EB5AN has requested these records and believes that they will confirm the concerns raised in the due-diligence summary.
EB5AN has also asked the court to allow certain EB5 United project documents marked “confidential” to become part of the public court record. According to EB5AN, these documents were available to the public before the lawsuit and were only later designated “confidential” during the litigation. EB5AN believes these documents will show how EB5 United presented its project to potential investors, including the forecasts and valuations it provided for the project. In EB5AN’s view, investors should have the chance to review these documents and draw their own conclusions.
EB5AN’s discovery requests have focused on the documents at the center of EB5 United’s allegations. EB5AN is inviting proof, not avoiding it.
EB5 United’s discovery requests, however, reflect a different focus. EB5 United has served EB5AN with more than 200 requests for production. Some of these requests are for communications between EB5AN and investors and overseas marketing partners in several countries, including China and India. EB5AN has responded to that discovery while asserting appropriate objections and protections for private investor information.
And EB5 United’s demands have reached beyond EB5AN. EB5 United has issued subpoenas to eighteen foreign nationals who, EB5AN believes, did nothing more than express interest in EB-5 investment opportunities. Each subpoena “commands” the recipient to appear in person for sworn, video-recorded questioning by EB5 United’s lawyers. Anyone who fails to appear has been warned that he or she may be held in contempt of court.
Those who received these subpoenas—foreign nationals who are not parties to the lawsuit—may be forced to respond. They may be required to produce sensitive documents and to travel for their depositions, which would mean giving up time and paying legal fees and other costs. Those who choose not to comply may be held in contempt of court.
EB5AN considers these tactics invasive and fundamentally wrong. In EB5AN’s view, prospective investors should not be required to appear for video-recorded questioning under penalty of perjury simply because they explored competing projects or asked reasonable due-diligence questions.
EB5AN’s Response and Counterclaims
EB5AN has denied EB5 United’s claims and filed counterclaims of its own. In March 2025, EB5AN filed counterclaims alleging, among other things, that EB5 United ran a paid Google search advertisement built around the name of EB5AN’s Twin Lakes Georgia project. EB5AN became aware of this paid advertisement in the summer of 2024.
Twin Lakes Georgia is a single-family, active-adult home development for seniors and retirees near Atlanta, Georgia. At the time EB5 United ran the ad, Twin Lakes Georgia was already highly popular. Each EB-5 fund EB5AN opened for the project quickly filled up.
By June 30, 2024, the project’s EB-5 funds had received subscriptions from more than 350 EB-5 investors, with another fund on track to push that total above 450. The project had produced 3,297 qualifying jobs. It had sold 652 homes, and 527 of them were built, closed, and turned over to buyers. The main clubhouse and pickleball courts were complete and open.
Twin Lakes Georgia was an attractive and sought-after EB-5 project. It remains one of EB5AN’s flagship rural projects and one of the most successful EB-5 projects on the market. As of April 2026, 883 homes have been sold, with 797 built and delivered.
According to EB5AN, when the phrase “twin lakes eb5” was searched, a sponsored result appeared displaying EB5 United’s name and a link to its website under the heading “Twin Lakes Rural Project.”
EB5AN’s counterclaims allege that this conduct creates a false association between EB5 United and the Twin Lakes Georgia project. In EB5AN’s view, advertising of this kind can confuse investors about who is sponsoring a project. For an EB-5 investor, choosing a sponsor is one of the most consequential financial decisions in the EB-5 process. EB5AN believes investors are entitled to make that choice free of misleading marketing.
EB5AN understands why EB5 United would want to be associated with one of EB5AN’s most successful projects. But investors should not have to guess whose project it is.
EB5AN finds EB5 United’s conduct and lawsuit ironic. EB5 United sued over allegedly false statements made by EB5AN while, according to EB5AN’s counterclaims, EB5 United ran an advertisement that could confuse investors about who sponsored Twin Lakes Georgia.
In total, the counterclaims set out six causes of action under federal and Florida law: false advertising, false designation of origin, misleading advertising, unfair competition, unjust enrichment, and tortious interference.
EB5AN’s tortious interference claim is based on a video published by EB5 United—which has since been taken down—and subsequent written messaging from EB5 United. In the video and messaging, EB5 United alleged that EB5AN and its principals knowingly spread lies about EB5 United’s project to deter investors. EB5AN alleges that these statements by EB5 United were false and directly interfered with EB5AN’s business and relationships. EB5AN maintains that its statements about Lakefront Estates were fact-based opinions, not falsehoods.
EB5AN is vigorously pursuing these counterclaims and is confident that the full record will support its position.
Why This Matters for EB-5 Investors
EB-5 investors rely on candid, independent assessments of projects. Conducting sound due diligence means speaking with more than one regional center sponsor. EB5AN encourages those conversations and believes competition is healthy. Prospective investors should be able to compare projects, ask hard questions, and speak with more than one sponsor without being drawn into a dispute between competitors. The industry needs more transparency, not less.
EB5AN believes this litigation raises questions of broader interest to the EB-5 industry:
- When are competitor due-diligence comments protected opinion?
- When does such commentary become actionable?
- What is the scope of discovery that parties may seek from EB-5 investors and other third parties?
Those questions are now before the court. In the meantime, investors can watch how each party conducts itself: what it asks the court to make public, and whom it subpoenas.
Investor-Centered Sponsorship
At EB5AN, transparency is a core principle. EB5AN’s project documents are available for EB-5 investors and their advisors to review. EB5AN invites scrutiny and is happy to answer questions from investors and their advisors.
But transparency cannot be at the expense of the privacy of our investors and prospective investors. EB5AN has not issued a subpoena to a prospective investor for exploring—or even choosing—a competitor’s project and does not believe that practice is appropriate.
EB5AN’s view is that anyone weighing an EB-5 project—whether sponsored by EB5AN or another regional center—should have access to the information needed to make an informed decision. EB-5 investors should be able to conduct diligence on as many projects as they would like. They should be free to speak with more than one sponsor without fear of retribution.
EB5AN will keep defending against EB5 United’s claims, pursuing its own counterclaims, and standing up for the transparency EB-5 investors deserve.
If you are comparing EB-5 projects and want EB5AN’s no-cost perspective, schedule a call today.