i'm robert joe but i'm appearing then we have the petitioner jon karl in the starting in reversing the immigration judges granted asylum in withholding the removal of the board offer just one justification the immigration judge found that he had suffered harms that rises to the level of past persecution and she found that even if he had he has a well founded fear of suffering harm it would rise to the level of persecution in the future and the board didn't disturb that find the agency for which he worked in italy was quote aberrational and i'm that particular factional point i think the board is just flat out wrong now we cited one particular document in our briefing but i think it it's worth quoting once again this is at page two sixty five the administrative record it's working paper on corruption in italy and it relates to the time period that was that's at issue in this case it says after nine hundred ninety two the clean hands investigation of political corruption brought about the most serious political crisis in the history of the italian republic the investigation reached the highest levels of the public administration in effect in most of the areas states activities more than five hundred former  parliamentarians were implicated many former ministers five former premiers thousands it says thousands of local administrators and public functionaries the army the customs service which is responsible for investigating financial crimes in general the main publicly owned companies and even sectors of the magistri itself there's just absolutely no way you can say that that kind of corruption is aberrational the g which is the organization that mr serry worked for his sworn statement indicates that in one nine hundred ninety four there was a district attorney in the lotto that was an engaged in an investigation of the g d s itself it resulted in the rest of two hundred credibility so not an issue and i did speak to that specifically if we were to agree with you that on account of political opinion has been shown wouldn't we still have to  to the b i and to determine whether the harm rose to the level of persecution because they actually didn't decide that question one way or another they never got there in the analysis i don't think so i have to go back and look at  the government's brief in this case but i think not because if the government i don't think the government raised this issue in their brief to the floor but it's a forward i think if you say so i don't think it was challenged before the board and if it wasn't challenge before the board then i would say no there's no point in really ending it but let me ask you that we don't have an adoption of the i j s right determination and so that's easy case number one right instead we have a more of an almost legal discourse about the extent of corruption that one has to prove right so that you that you can judge graver question if you the governing document that  is there i mean that's well i don't see any yeah documents so i look at it somewhat differently it's seems to me the immigration judge laid out certain legal findings i mean among those findings she said you know there's harm that rises to the level of past persecution  well founded fear of such harm as well and she also went on to say and also it's clearly an account of political opinion now the board when it reviewed that says it disagreed with the immigration judge on that one point that it's not on account of political opinion i didn't disturb that finding and from our perspective yes the inference would be that they agreed with it or they didn't find it to be clearly iranians why  that they felt no need to think about it at all yeah i understand that perspective and i don't think that my position is clearly correct in any way but my view is that the board in part i have to go back and look at what the government argued is it seems to me if the government argued this point and they and the board simply skipped over it and the side of the case on the grounds i think our position be stronger what about this approach  because my under my hypothesis at least whatever they say we're going to say this was a little persecution because the evidence compels them i don't think you can i don't think you can do that if judge grader's correct same question i get i think ventura with control yes i think again i think it goes back to what the government argued in its brief and that may be dispositive here because i think if the government didn't raise this issue to the board then the precedents of court would say that the government should have another chance to argue that before that warning and as you stand here right this moment you can't recollect can't read or watch the i need to leave you here finally as you sit down and wait for the rebuttal in that regard you and then treated specially as a waiver on that point is that what you write yes i mean how what procedures and the way this court has big looked at that in other cases it says basically the government should have another bite at the apple they have dropped to make that argument they didn't make any such argument and it should time in here from the government that this case is not like or like hassan another case that was addressed in the briefs and grab of the court noted in finding that a law enforcement official in the philippines had indeed exposed a government wide smuggling operation the court noted importantly to keith sachs one being that the government failed to punish the corrupt individuals and that these individuals were so intertwined with the government that they were instruments of the government itself similarly in h there was persecution the court noted several key facts again that the police and members of of the government were indifferent to the official's actions and secondly that the official it openly said that he was had effective influence over  were not intended to were not intended to influence or not not against the italian government itself because the italian government itself has spoken out publicly against and has prosecuted persons for corruption and some government is actively taking action to control this issue you know what my problem with the b o h decision is and you can help me on this the statement is not demonstrated that there was the government corruption in italy and it's never been my understanding that you have to take on the entire country when you bring a political persecution clinton in other words he doesn't i don't understand why he would need to show the whole government or the whole government is or is not responding there is a very discreet portion of the government here that's the issue so what's the legal basis for the statement made by the cia well i think with the b i am getting there was actually was a whistle blowing against corrupt individuals and and that that was a blowing was essentially an action by the by that petitioner indicating his political opposition to the the activities and the policies of the government itself here we can say that mr that is actions in expressing his corruption and expressing his opposition official tally retaliation against those who expose them and prosecute government corruption me in appropriate circumstances the persecution on account of political opinion what would you like to do in your view to me that standard well i think we have to look at what that what persecution means i mean the very term persecution is is activity that the government and the government is either and owning it is either acting out themselves and their persecuting an individual based on political opinion or they are condoning the activities of another group that's persecuting someone based on their political opinion because they're either unable or unwilling to control that behavior melding together the question of whether he's been persecuted with him whether whatever it is that's happened to our midst happened on account of his political opinion and it may very well be that what's happened to him on account of his political opinion know private action or public action but not through bad or whatever but why isn't it still on account of his political opinion i understand you're saying i think that there i think these issues do in this context become question in the courts the board would still need to determine the issue of whether or not just the actions by these corrupt individuals or actions that the government was either unwilling or unable to control because that is still part of the ultimate test to determine whether  of political opinion your honor i haven't i haven't done such an evaluation of the other cases but i'm thinking and the fact that the case the way that i see them it's it occurs to me that if we're claiming that this individual is indeed a that's what we would send it back presumably for the paying for the i consider we're only looking at one narrow slice of it so even if we were to say whatever happened just on account of that doesn't necessarily mean that he explained in decisions because what it requires is that the person's actions and whistleblowing were taken were directed at the government institution itself and i think that if that's the question that we're asking i don't think we can argue that mr missed that he's actions were taken against their telling government itself because the telling government itself is indeed it has indeed shown that they also are in opposition the majority of them are in opposition to this question that they have i so therefore i don't you know that would be our position obviously i just want to go back to just grader's question because that seems to be a much bigger question than this particular case it seems to me that if we're going to just assume that the board skipped over that question that and it's so that they could make another decision addressing those questions that's sort of invites the boards to engage in peace now piecemeal decision making and that's a problem for somebody like mr in the city who found will make no such presumption for purposes of this case well it's in the court of appeals will presume credibility because it has to be renamed it back because the board expressed the reserved making a decision on that point where the board doesn't expressly do so i think in order to avoid piecemeal decision making especially in cases like this where people can actually be deported and forced to wait for a decision and we all know how long it takes for these things to work through that but of course the practical consequences let's just say we agree with that yeah proposition and you know if we get it  have when we started as a practical matter with me i don't think so because that's not what the board has done in the credibility contacts they often just assume credibility and decide cases without expressed reservations the factual issue that plays out in  legal context these are legal determinations that they you know there's like a four step process that they need to go through but they don't need to you can win or even lose on any one of them you need all of them to win right so if if they pick one and then say we reserve everything else i don't see how in the long run that would change the calculus but if i'm the commissioners if forces the board to be clear about whether they are in fact reserving or whether they've rejected the government's argument on a particular point because here what  the court is saying is we should just assume that the board reserved on this question and didn't reject the government's position but we don't know that and the board should be clear as to whether or not it's it has rejected the government's position on this point or reserved for making a decision on that point and the only way that we can force them to do that is to tell them to be expressed about it thank you thank you for shit the arguments from science and the case just aren't you just