No. Read each person’s actual immigration record. A qualifying L spouse’s work benefit depends on valid status and appropriate evidence, not the principal’s flight schedule.
Keep individual permission dates visible
Eligible temporary dependents include a spouse and unmarried children under 21. Children do not receive the spouse’s work benefit. A planned return trip does not extend or establish the household’s authorized stay.
The L-2 spouse's position is comparatively favourable: since USCIS policy recognized spousal employment incident to status, an L-2 spouse admitted with the spouse annotation on the I-94 may work for any US employer without a separate employment-authorization document, although some employers still ask for one. Employment authorization incident to status removes a separate application step, but it can create a practical difficulty at hiring: not every employer's onboarding process is familiar with it, and a spouse may need to explain what the Form I-94 notation means. None of this alters the principal’s own case, which still turns on a qualifying relationship between the entities, one continuous year of qualifying employment abroad within the preceding three years, duties that are primarily managerial or executive, and the seven-year ceiling on L-1A time.