thank you in this case the p a was able to find that petitioner had not demonstrated a political nexus to his persecution only because to be a bit more and mischaracterized critical record evidence that supports petitioners claims during the record as a whole no reasonable fact finder could find that mr gonna split opinion with not at least one central reason for his brutal persecution that he suffered in yemen and the persecution he reasonably fears if you return there this is true because petitioners testimony which the i found to be completely credible in taints example after example of got him communicating his anti who people to opinion to his persecutors immediately before his persecution began showing that the entire series of percy's tour events were triggered by his expression of that opinion his testimony contains example after example of gotham's persecutors communicating their political motive to him when they beat him took his family away kidnapped and tortured him for two weeks to obtain a judgment ten year sentence and arrest order against petitioner explicitly because of his political association and activity and again petitioners credible unrebutted testimony is that all those later of bents were based and explicitly on his political expression and activities you said you say solian explicitly are you dropping religion is protected grounds for him getting any relief yes let's fips we're not we're not contesting that he's eligible for tori conduct he experienced your current experience was after a conversation and i think december two thousand and eleven and then his brothers in law which include kind of a cousin as well as i understand so that you need to divorce her sister and then he said no i'm not divorcing your sister and so at one level i mean this gets into a little what is one central reason i  if he would have divorced their sister he would have been tortured or were treated so poorly as he'd been treated and so the really interesting thing comes down to will maybe they requested that he divorced them based on his political opinion maybe it was something else maybe it was that they wanted to go to he wanted to go to school could a lot of things but what prompted if this were a proximate cause analysis instead of the one central reason tast what under the b s logic below one could easily characterize that as a personal or familial tension but what this court looked at is what motivated the father to do this to his son and in that case the court said that there can be no serious dispute that what motivated the father was that he had caught his son with another man and so the protected ground of sexual orientation was invoked and despite the fact that the violence in the persecution was committed on a familial level the court looks  r i would point to the record it a r four hundred and forty two and that describes all of the things that that kind of persecutor said to him during his torture and that included they were demanding that he quote give them information  he probably never would have been attacked your honor that that gets to the one central reason test and even under the government's analysis conceding that the divorce demand was based on his political opinion also makes his political opinion for cause of all the persecution that followed so even if even if there was an element of familial tension outside of his political opinion which i would contend the record doesn't reveal anything like what the government did not any testimony from gun or introduce any other evidence suggesting that there was another motive aside from the fact that the brothers in law and then the other men who joined them to persecute him didn't like his political play well now that the mystery record says that they were worried that he would bring shame to their tribe by having his his wife educated now now i mean that sounds like that to be a familial tension where there's a familial disagreement between what sort of reputation you bring to  family but it's also weird that he got released after he agree to divorce which suggests to me that if political motivation is the reason that you're torturing someone then you release him once he says hey oh i've read it worse my wife and so if it was still political tension then why wouldn't they queue political persecution why would they keep him there they think they should have kept him there was no end point because he didn't r the uphill battle that your client faces is that we're under substantial evidence review if this were beyond a reasonable doubt or this for preponderance of the evidence or they were convincing evidence but d but what happens is substantial evidence counts for upholding a gencies decision even when there is some countervailing four points the question is would reviewing court be compelled to reach the opposite conclusion and i guess what i'm saying is it's hard to feel compelled to reach that conclusion when he gets released upon agreeing to divorce is what we are and this court has over and over again said that the principles that govern substantial evidence are also that where findings and conclusions are based on or presumptions not reasonably grounded in the record as a whole that's inconsistent with substantial evidence and in this case this year would submit that no reasonable fact finder can find based on the record that political opinion was in at least one thirty nine where he called the who these criminals and threats to the country again these are statements that he is making to his brothers in law at the time not knowing that they were who peace i would also point to eric to the night where he told them about protesting at the site we call the land of change close quote and quote going against the shia close quote now protesting at the site we call the land of change was dignity friday which was a part of the arab spring to say but i up allying with so law so that that context in the record shows that his expressing that he had been at dignity friday today and was going to be a political expression that they you know ultimately did not like and it you know i mean it's strikes me that the he has to specifically state a political opinion in order to qualify for this particular social group  he called them criminals he called them threats to the country criticize them over and over again he said that she who to have become very dangerous to the country is are in this record i thought he also refused to join them when the expression the brothers in law came with other massed arm treat the man and got him so that was the st one and then a few weeks after that after they had had taken his wife and two and a young child away they came back and they kidnapped him and they tortured him and again that was not just condoms brothers in law that was also these other fifty men who got him recognized as who the men because he had been doing work with his uncle who works for the legacy government security service and he evidence that he actually held this political view but i thought one of the points that you were making in your brief was that under cases like all that you need to show is that political opinion was imputed to him  that's correct that's for us and i'm just providing the context on the background because i think that does shed light on what some of the statements he made to his brother some of what those statements met and so what they are what they have what is political  persecuted and then the reason is because you know how i would if it's a sure bring that type of evidence to bear in you know in the united states really there's no right some kind of record because he was he was taken into   you know repeatedly were interrogating him and they called him a spot and they told him to give them information so it's in the context of the activities condom had been working on with his uncle all that suggests that even aside from that contact w but that's but being a spy is different than having a political opinion right being a spy i mean like that that's action that that that is that is very very different on kind of the opinion actions spectrum someone receives retribution for being a spy maybe they were spying based on in some part motivated by a political opinion but it's also the action associated with that  forced from the political opinion by it but furthering some some other object and so it strikes me that the spy point the best thing that you could do is what judge krauss said which is look they thought it was a spine they were punishing  for being a spy their punishment because they thought he was a spotlight based on what his political opinion was is anti who the political opinion that that strikes me the best you can make a spotlight because i don't know that being a spy is one of the particular social groups protect certainly gets hits and i think that that that statement in conjunction with the others just demonstrates that the persecutors both the brothers in law and the others who are persecuted shooting him we're persecuting you just because you're a spot we don't care who you're spying for we don't care anything else being a spy brings disrepute to our family spies are inherently untrustworthy and now we're going to you know take you kidnap you for two weeks because you're a spot that's not a that's not a protected group is it or your honor paul political opinion is broader than a given protected group and again for instance espinosa court has you have a situation where simply opposing a particular political group is itself a political opinion or certainly an imputed political opinion that can give rise to it in terms of the computed political opinion and i did twenty years was asking about documentation i thought it was part of the it had been mistreated record and in part of the record here on appeal that  diminished or limited weight to the documents simply because there was not a certified translation provided there are english translations of the arabic in the record and those are at a r nine hundred and seventy nine and a r nine hundred and seventy five dollars but what those documents show is that the men the same men who tortured got him in two thousand and fourteen went to a coup de controlled court and the hooty security service and they got a ten year prison sentence and judgment against him and absentia and in order for his arrest and again that's circulated as just press pointed out to all land air and sea ports and yemen and the documents say this on their face and that they were explicitly issued because of his political association and activity against the regime so  the only dispute was about whether certified translations were provided the immigration judge asked the government if it would look into you know where these documents arose from and what the government said in the next hearing was that it was unable to do so did it if we agreed with you and you have asked that the next step be that he be declared eligible by this court for asylum ends and end i under your honor petition or request that the court make a decision on eligibility and petitioner recognizes that that is a rare circumstance and a rare request but because neither of those elements were meaningfully contested below the record is overwhelmingly clear that what got him endured easily meets the threshold for past persecution view to militantly which is how this court looks at past persecution as as the court said in harass or even taking any individual act that occurred and again the record is clear on this based on gonna be testimony and based on the other documentary evidence in the record and secondly there's no real dispute that it was the government that participated in g persecution initially you have to keep the rebels including the brothers in law that take and torture him but then as the who these take over the security service and court and as the original persecutors employ agents of the state to get an order for his arrest and to get a judgment against him there we have the government doing the persecuting and there's no dispute about that below so so is it your point that if he were to go back to him and he would  that order the exact wording of that judgment is quote for his association with al mccluskey group to incite order against the regime and for anti sex sedition closed quote and then the arrest circular has slightly certain regions and in and and also seems to make the finding that he would be able to go back to another area of yemen  where he was not as correct so so the question resettlement the court actually did find with concern to his cattle and that he could that he didn't prove that he would go back to a beauty controlled area and so that question remains to be determined mainly even now i've made a determination both about the who the rebels effectively being the governmental body and i made a determination about is the ability to relocate then are aren't all of those issues ones that we are reviewing st for substantial evidence but they got the call but the agency said don't go mental body in only certain areas when you look at the evidence in the in the record it shows that the who t f control the northwestern area in yemen which is just south of saudi arabia but the rest of the country is under dispute from a number of remaining factions heidi government which which also considers itself the true government of yemen  ringback forces the united states was was devolved to a certain extent i believe that most recently was true but but they were also involved so it is a huge remaining portion of yemen that is not under control i  the elements i would say no and no because it's very important in this case bet's he was persecuted if if if we were to agree that that the treatment amounts of persecution he was he was mistreated by a very small portion you know of the population and those happened to be his problems in law you know they were those were the only people that he showed that  does not say is that he was released with the aid of a shake of the artful eye he tried so it wasn't the entire tribe who the record also shows that they did lean into the ho you know political theory but when it came down to the mistreatment you know it was his brothers in law along with cousins and other unidentified people who came along to help it was his brothers in law who initiated and they brought their buddies basically but when it when he was detained by his brothers in law and being mistreated it was a shake from the alpha law he tried which is who his the government that calls for his arrest or detention you know i would i would just i would dispute that and the reason that i would is because the situation in yemen has been very very complicated however what the record does show is that the who tees did not take over they did not control gain control of some now which is the capital of yemen until september of two thousand and fourteen this this the immigration judge gave very little weight to that circular and i would point out that the circular shows it was issued by a supposed who teach intro government in july of two thousand and fourteen the record shows that the cooties didn't even facade their supreme council until january of two thousand and fifteen because i go where the who he's running their own courts in the interim director doesn't show that they were and in fact the court the government it shows on the top of that circular west on an aura it doesn't even appear anywhere on the record there is an arm on government but when you look at the map they are five of five is not even doesn't even show anywhere you know and it may have been some self appointed hooty court but that doesn't mean that they had the power to issue a circular to all courts will airports of yemen they didn't even have control government who was given the opportunity to to provide its own translation or to bring forward evidence of lack of authenticity right well it may not be an authentic but i would say that there are other documents that the of of the document to the government i have that i don't believe that i don't believe that if the i g gave that gave the government the opportunity but the i g does not have have to accept a translation that is not certified and so this was not  only after they found out i brought charges they started looking for me and they they brought this case against him it was not because of his political opinion it was because he he obtain down what would the circular i mean the circular seems to suggest that all of the gantry and i mean i guess we have to assume that the who the control of the ports of entry says to everyone out there we don't like him we don't like him because of his collusion and association with the gulf again mr ghanem did not have the original documents number one there were e mail documents to him he also had family members who are united states citizens who live in michigan who are available who did not come in to testify for him who could have testified to his political opinion who could have testified to the treatment  that happened and who could have testified about the circular but i would i would also point out that he took into account the fact that when he came in and this is a man who had been who had been raised at least for six years in the united states so he knew how the united states function in terms of its law enforcement he told he told the inspire the immigration inspections officer that he it was finances that made him to anything that showed what his political opinion was all of his statements when he came in there was no political opinion so the only political opinion is what he testified to and he testifies that he along w of other people attended this this march two thousand and eleven day of dignity he doesn't say he was recognized he doesn't say he was pointed out he was not even harmed at that he also said that after that white when he after his daughter was was born he backed off from involved being involved in any political activity he never identifies a group of people and although the petitioner you know was not aware hoodies did not did not hold up with sol a and help far after two thousand and fifteen when they took control late it's ruined them at some point but then broke away from them and was actually killed by the ho s so don't mind if i pronounce your name correctly i guess that's correct i understand that he he on various occasions and expressed dissatisfaction time that he supposedly complained the people needed to have the our rights and he doesn't he doesn't even say we're rights those were he doesn't say what group people onto he didn't say who he attended this  day of dignity which was against the then current government which was sally but he doesn't claim that he talked with with anyone other than his brothers in law long does that matter all that matters is that he's been and he's been attributed by others to hold that political can and that may be a different political opinion than the it's fine if the immigration judge don't want to give that way but it needs an explanation appropriate for why it doesn't want to give the immigration years having to show your work like a business where they have to show why they don't want of the pro se position of the because the court recognizes the difficulties faced by detained here in these documents will not be excluded excluded but will be afforded the diminished weight they deserve under the circumstances so the immigration judge doesn't explain what he is doing and and and challenged the petition in this case on the fact that these were not original documents and  do you challenge the accuracy have of the translation is no your honor if it were me i would challenge the accuracy of the documents themselves because i don't i don't believe that they are what they proport to be particularly the circular perhaps not in absentia order but then again mr common set that the only reason they went after him was because he sued them and got a judgment against them that's why they went after him in court as  were emailed to him we have no idea there's no indication in the record that there's even a west court there is no i mean there's no indication of a mustn't look towards me the deputy minister of justice of it's fabricated if the i j a did that then maybe substantial evidence would support the i j a suspicion but the problem is the i j a said i'm going to give them some way just not a lot of weight and once you treat it that way then he has to explain a reason for not giving it more weight in a circular calling for someone's arrest based on their association with the disfavored group seems to be pretty strong evidence can there's two ways we can bring the position one is for compelled on the evidence or two if we find that the agency below did not consider the whole record so the compelled presumption only triggers after we find that they've adequately addressed the whole record and so if there is an inadequacy in the whole record review if they don't consider certain evidence then they don't get the benefit of that compelled presumption in their favor and what i'm saying is how do we know that this gets the whole record presumption i mean it's you know it's like a lot of things you know i don't know what the immigration judge was thinking but the immigration judge obviously what the documents taught them for what they were are and and found they did not figure into the fact that it was no place in his record where this petition are expressed used you don't even know what his political opinion is he says i don't agree with these i don't like my alliance i don't like he doesn't belong to any group he doesn't belong to so i think i can't explain what was in the judge's head i will say that the judge took it into account gave it looked at it considered it and did court documents that the immigration judge gave some weight to and we have nothing in this record that suggests other than the family connection that you substantial evidence but but you have his own statement in his asylum declaration in which he says that it was only after he sued them that they came after him and went for one for this order so they may have a poll and may be able to bribe somebody to to enter an order against him it's not because of his political opinion it's because of retaliation for what he did and if the immigration judge gave it that way but said it doesn't show his political opinion that is a fair and so let me just lou just piece together what you say and you're basically saying in in some of it makes sense but after  bizzle you're saying it's maybe these brothers and we were able to get a court to enter a maybe a kangaroo court whatever you want to call it to enter our judgment jasmine is no good and it was only it was always motivated by family familial tension not group is like a crime family then i guess the show's not political opinion but its association with currency and so i guess to me it hinges on whether or not but what if we're getting is a political association but he did not he didn't rely on imputed political opinion he relied on actual political opinion he said that he told his brothers in law and this is really the only opinion it is hard to place on this research on the basis of political opinion that that that opinion was never he never out of his mouth that he claimed or in any of the documents and in fact all of his previous asylum documents say he was not a political person that he left because of the conflict and didn't want to get involved but he never claimed membership in elements lawfully group and the record contains no evidence that there is and all of that is a problem for him and it was his burden to prove that he had a determining whether substantial evidence supports the judge's closure and yes he would not persecuted on the political opinion but the statute and and my opponent you know argues in his brief and seems to argue here that simply because the immigration judge found him credible therefore you must give him asylum that is not what the statute says and that's not what this court has said in sharia and in the statute it says credible testimony may be sufficient if it is persuasive and i forget what the other terminology is but for that specifically he said that his that his evidence was insufficient that he did not prove what his political opinion was that it was not sufficient evidence in here so the fact that he was credible doesn't mean he could have gotten up and testified my family deep me and you know and i was married to a daughter and they took and they and they forced me to divorce his daughter that would be credible but it would not show what his political opinion was it has to be one incredible it has to be substantive and prove that he had a political opinion that he expressed was to his brothers or his brothers in law were were individuals who were family members who had the power to remove their sister it wasn't the government at that point that was coming after him  group no your honor i didn't say that i said he testified that he told his brothers in law that he was against the cooties at the point that he told his brother in law that he was against the hutus were not in power they were up they were a political i'm not even sure they were a political group at that point the who he is did not gain control until i can i can give you and thirty four they did not establish this supreme council intel january two thousand and fifteen he claims that this happened in december of two thousand and eleven and january two thousand and twelve months sali was still in power and he was against salei and at that point to who t's were looking to to bring down salary as well he expressed and he said that he didn't like the hooty as he was against the violence but he expressed that opinion to his brothers in law and that's the issue you vaguely reference is talking about rights and about people having rights and about going to other or other ways that he doesn't identify and john appear i would say that the question of future persecution is not in front of court because that's not the court can only decide on what the board decided here or what the board decided was there was not sufficient evidence objective evidence demonstrating was political or religious affiliation and participation which are central to his claim that's what they decided so what they decided was that it was not best persecution now regardless  likelihood of that he had not shown persecution on the basis of political opinion and so we've been talking about whether there is as a potential evidence supports the conclusion that he was not persecuted with an inference that that would continue because of past persecution or simply future persecution but but either way whether there's a nexus to political opinion right that's the only thing with the immigration judge and the board decided in this case was next it's they did not go to future persecution they could have gone there because someone can prove a well founded fear of future persecution regardless of past persecution if they submit sufficient evidence showing even though they weren't persecute in the past you know the evidence shows that there is all that they will be for persecuted there's a well founded fear were to consider the fact that you know if you were to decide that they did consider a well founded fear of future persecution there is the problem of nexus here and so i would i w the links in this chain of events would have to occur my opponent or use you know the that there was a wrong standard for acquiescence but that is not what what the court what the i j a and the and the board even talked about in their decision what they talked about was him not proving a likelihood of persecution because not he did not start with the likelihood of each one of those ranks and my opponent does not address those lengths and does not address the evidence to counseling and so i would say that that he has waived that that argument and i would ask the court to deny the petition thank you very much thank you mr weaver if you is whether the persecutor attributed a political opinion to the victim and acted upon that the entire course of prosecutorial conduct in this case shows that that is exactly what happened both with the gotham's brothers and mauls the other hooty men who joined unclear exactly how that works other than it is very clear on the face of both of those documents that they are based on petitioners association with that group and quote incitement against the regime  so it has a political connotations to roger though and i guess i guess the thought is this if it's if it's if it's like a crime group right if someone says you know we've got to who got a crime group that's up and then you know the government that's that's a different thing but this has to be a political group and i guess i'm i'm struggling here with who this group is because the adjective really explained and if he's the former deputy prime minister but gonna was opposed to the prior regime it seems strange that he would be associated in a positive way it was someone from that regime and so i feel like i've got to be missing a few steps but because that doesn't make sense right to say i didn't like solace or seen but i'm associated with the deputy prime minister from that regime and because of that association i'm now being targeted to incite order against order and the regime and for anti she s edition host quote so despite the record not being entirely clear on how that all mccloskey group or prime minister deputy prime minister or coffee fits into the political picture those documents show that they are issued based on petitioners association with those groups which are against the coup to control regime at that time well that's that it's that last part that we that i guess the b about and so i don't view those as political groups i view those as some other non political group they can be crime they can be some other work is a set of us political then maybe his association would be on the base political opinion but some other association but i guess the answer is it was the i j a to spell that out in accounting for this is opposed to your job but it is it is weird because there is a bit of a switch his brothers in law didn't didn't mistreat him because of the arm of coffee gang they never said anything about that as far as i can tell in the record and so now it's almost like it's a new opinion that's been attributed to him that's different or more specific or more focused your honor that's my understanding is that he was the deputy prime minister and that government is the one that was forced into exile so it's a law came down i believe it was two thousand and twelve or two thousand and eleven and then you have the heidi government which you know that minister were forced into exile if i could make one other point on the circle in judgment there was no dispute below about the about the provenance or the authenticity of those documents the only issue that the i g pointed to was the lack of a certified translation and i would represent to the court that petitioner has had those documents translated again and has a translation that has the stamp certified translation on it and english translation is same as the english transition translation in the record and petitioners happy to provide a letter to the court attaching those if that would be useful but the key point though is that all those documents did they are smoking gun evidence of political persecution but they just in the record it a r five hundred and thirty four the twenty seven thousand state department report says quote who the rebels controlled most of the security apparatus and state institutions close quote and that's throughout the entire country not just in the regions that they had