Where have you seen in the tax law saying that it's mandatory to classify as qualified? Please share because this is confusing and it does seem to be a choice.
Something that may be of interest that I added to my response but it's here too:
"In summary, when a taxpayer has foreign-source qualified dividend income with foreign tax paid on the income, the tax adviser may need to test the tax return computations under the above two scenarios, i.e., qualified dividend income scenario versus investment income scenario, to determine which results in the lower overall tax burden."
https://protaxconsulting.com/blog/maximizing-foreign-tax-credit/
