PUBLISH UNITED STATES CO URT OF APPEALS FOR THE TENTH CIRCUIT

________________ _________________ OCTAVIO GUTIERREZ-OROZCO, a/k/a Octavio Orozco, Petitioner,

v. LORETTA E. LYNCH, United States Attorney General, Respondent. No. 15-9534

________________ _________________ Petition for Review of Decision of the Board of Immigration Appeals

________________ _________________ Submitted on the briefs: * J. Shawn Foster, Perretta Law Office , West Jordan, Utah , for Petitioner. Benjamin C. Mizer, Principal Deputy Assistan t Attorney General; Linda S. Wernery, Assistant Director; Thankful T. Vanderstar, Attorney , Office of Immigration Litigation, United States Depa rtment of Justice, Washi ngton, D.C., for Respondent.

________________ _________________ Before BACHARACH , O’BRIEN , and PHILLIPS , Circuit Judges.

________________ _________________ O’BRIEN , Circuit Judge.

* After examining the briefs and appellate record, th is panel has determined unanimously that oral argument would not ma terially assist in the determination of this appeal. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(a)(2); 10th Cir. R. 34.1(G). The case is therefore ordered submitted without oral argument. FILED United States Court of Appeals Tenth Circuit 

### January 21, 2016 Elisabeth A. Shumaker Clerk of Court2 ________________ _________________ Octavio Gutierrez-Orozco (Gutierrez), a native and citizen of Mexico, entered the United States illegally. An immigrat ion judge (IJ) denied his application for cancellation of removal and his alternative request for voluntary de parture. The IJ decided his generally credible testimony wa s insufficiently persuasive, considering all of the other evidence, to meet his burden to prove ten years of continuous physical presence in the United States. The Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) agreed. So do we. I. Background Gutierrez insists he entered the United St ates in March 1996. He remembers that date because his wife, who remained in Mexico, was pregnant with the second of their four children, who was born in Septembe r 1996. He claims to have lived in the United States continuously since then, except for a brief, two-month trip back to Mexico in mid-1999 when his wife was ill — after which border patrol twice hindered his reentry. His wife jo ined him here sometime in 2000. Gutierrez’s immigration troubles began in February 2008, when a domestic violence incident with his teenage son led to a simple assault conviction the next month. Sh ortly thereafter, the Department of Homeland Security is sued a Notice to Appear, charging him as removable unde r the Immigration and Nationality Act3 (INA). Gutierrez conceded removability but requested cancellation of removal 1 or, in the alternative, voluntary departure. The IJ conducted a h earing and concluded Gutierrez was statutorily ineligible for ca ncellation of removal because he did not demonstrate a ten-year conti nuous physical presence in th e United States from April 1, 1998, to April 1, 2008; 2 good moral character for th at time period; and an exceptional and extremely unusual hardship. The IJ also denied voluntary departure because Gutierrez failed to maintain good moral character during the relevant time frame and, alternatively, as an exercise of discretion. Gutierrez appealed to the BI A for relief from the IJ’s decision. It denied relief, deeming him ineligib le for cancellation of remova l because he failed to establish a ten-year conti nuous physical presence in th e United States. It also concluded the record supporte d the IJ’s discretionary deni al of voluntary departure. Gutierrez requests our review of the BIA’s decision. He is not entitled to relief.

1 The INA a uthorizes the Attorney General to cancel removal of an alien who is inadmissible or deportable if the alien satisfies four criteria: (1) the alien has been physically present in the Un ited States for a continuous period of not less than ten years preceding his application date; (2) th e alien has been a person of good moral character during that period; (3) the alien ha s not been convicted of certain offenses; and (4) “removal would result in exceptiona l and extremely unusual hardship to the alien’s spouse, parent, or child, who is a citizen of the United States or an alien lawfully admitted for permanent residence.” 8 U.S.C. § 1229b(b)(1)

. 2 Under the stop-time rule in 8 U.S.C. § 1229b(d)(1) , any period of continuous physical presence in the United States is deemed to end upon se rvice of a notice to appear. Gutierrez accepted service on Marc h 25, 2008, so the relevant time period is actually March 25, 1998, th rough March 25, 2008.4 II. Discussion A single BIA member affirmed the IJ ’s decision in a brief order under 8 C.F.R. § 1003.1(e)(5)

. We review that order as the final agency determination, limiting our review to the issues specifi cally addressed therein. Diallo v. Gonzales , 447 F.3d 1274, 1278-79 (10th Cir. 2006). But “we may consult the IJ’s opinion to the extent that the BIA relied up on or incorporated it,” Sarr v. Gonzales , 474 F.3d 783, 790 (10th Cir. 2007) , so as “to give substance to the BIA’s reasoning,” Razkane v. Holder , 562 F.3d 1283, 1287 (10th Cir. 2009). We review the BIA’s findings of fact under the substantial- evidence standard. Rivera-Jimenez v. I.N.S. , 214 F.3d 1213, 1216 (10th Cir. 2000). “[O]ur duty is to guarantee that factual determ inations are supported by reasonable, substantial and probative evidence considering the record as a whole.” Elzour v. Ashcroft , 378 F.3d 1143, 1150 (10th Ci r. 2004). This standard is “highly deferential.” Wiransane v. Ashcroft , 366 F.3d 889, 897 (10th Cir. 2004). To obtain reversal of factual findings, a petitioner must show the evidence he presented “was so compelling that no reasonable factfinder could find as the BIA did.” Rivera-Jimenez , 214 F.3d at 1216 (internal quotation marks omitte d). We review the BIA’s legal conclusions de novo, though we accord them deferenc e “unless they are clearly contrary to the statute’s language or to congr essional intent.” Id. A. Cancellation of Removal An alien seeking relief from removal bears the burden of establishing he satisfies the eligibility requirements and “mer its a favorable exerci se of discretion.”5 8 U.S.C. § 1229a(c)(4)(A) . Because the BIA based it s decision on limited grounds, we need only answer one question: Did Gutierrez establish hi s continuous physical presence in the United States fo r the applicable ten-year pe riod? He claims to have presented sufficient evidence on this subject through his testimony — he entered the United States in 1996 — and eight affidavi ts from friends and relatives who say he has been living here since 1997. We are unpersuaded. 1. Testimony According to Gutierrez’s te stimony at his removal hearing he entered the United States in March 1996. R. at 156. But he provided no details about his whereabouts or means of sustenance from the moment of purported entry until his employment paper trail began in August 1999. Despite this gap, he seems to argue his limited testimony was enough because the IJ did not make an adverse credibility determination. See Br. for Pet’r at 9 (“[T]he judge did not specifically find his testimony to be not credible for purpose s of meeting his burden of proof.”); id. at 10 (“The Immigration Judge discounted Mr. Gutierrez’s testimony though she did not make any specific finding that he was not credible.”). But credibility alone is not determ inative under the guidelines governing an IJ’s evaluation of an applicant’s test imony in a removal proceeding: “[T]he immigration judge will determine whether or not the testimony is credible, is persuasive, and refers to specific fact s sufficient to demonstrat e that the applicant has satisfied the applicant’s burden of proof ,” weighing “the credible testimony along with other evidence of record .” 8 U.S.C. § 1229a(c)(4)(B ) (emphasis added). Thus,6 even credible testimony may not be “persuasiv e or sufficient in light of the record as a whole.” Doe v. Holder , 651 F.3d 824, 830 (8th Cir. 2011) (explaining the statute contemplates an alien’s test imony may be credible but not persuasive, “for otherwise the second determination would be superfluous”); see also Aden v. Holder , 589 F.3d 1040, 1044-45 (9th Cir. 2009) (applying a similar interpretation to comparable text for asylum proceedings in 8 U.S.C. § 1158(b)(1)(B)(ii)). Here, “other evidence of record” calls into ques tion the persuasiveness of Gutierrez’s testimony. His appli cation lists an entry date of “02/1996.” R. at 325-26. And Gutierrez admitted (in a hearing regardi ng his request for volunt ary departure) to having entered the United States via Calif ornia on August 17, 1999 — a date his previous lawyer echoed when discussing Gutierrez’s “life of almost 10 years,” id. at 121-22 (emphasis added). Gutierrez ultim ately disclaimed this testimony and attributed it to nervousness. But the la ter entry date lines up neatly with the employment-related documents he submitted to substan tiate his application for cancellation of removal — including the Depart ment of the Treasury’s assignment of a tax identification number to him on Se ptember 14, 1999, a nd tax returns, W-2 forms, earnings statements, and other pr oof-of-income forms bearing dates in the 1999-to-2008 range. At the same time, documentary evidence for the 1996-to-1999 range is conspi cuously absent. 2. Affidavits The affidavits Gutierrez subm itted to try to fill the gap between 1996 and 1999 are equally unpersuasive (and a bit confusing since they all attest “Octavio has been7 living in the U.S. since 1997,” id. at 410-17, not 1996). All eight affidavits hail from the same template, with thr ee fill-in-the-blanks and thr ee typewritten, boilerplate

sentences. The IJ articulated a host of de ficiencies in the affidavits, id. at 95-96, and the BIA referenced and incorporated that di scussion into its decision concluding the affidavits do not establish Gutierrez’s presence in the United States since 1998, id. at 3-4. The same defi ciencies motivate our like conclusion: the affidavit statements do nothing to corr oborate Gutierrez’s testimony in a meaningful way. The critical information — the entry date — is presented only via a boile rplate statement. Further, the affidavits contain minimal pe rsonal information about the affiants and no information as to Gutierrez’ s location in the United States during the applicable time periods. Gutierrez’s evidence was not “so comp elling that no reasonable factfinder could find as the BIA did.” Rivera-Jimenez , 214 F.3d at 1216 (internal quotation marks omitted). He was required to esta blish his physical presence in the United States from at least March 25, 1998. But he convincingly established su ch presence only from 1999 to 2008—short of the requisite ten years. B. Voluntary Departure Gutierrez also challenges the discretiona ry denial of his application for voluntary departure, but we do not have jurisdiction to re view that decision. “No court shall have jurisdiction over an appeal from denial of a request for an order of voluntary departure under subs ection (b) of this section . . . .” 8 U.S.C. § 1229c(f);8 see also 8 U.S.C. § 1252(a)(2)(B)(i) (“[N]o cour t shall have jurisdiction to review — (i) any judgment regarding the granting of re lief under section . . . 1229c . . . of this title.”). “The agency’s deci sion not to grant voluntary depa rture is . . . discretionary and outside our jurisdiction in the absenc e of a constitutional or legal question,” Munis v. Holder , 720 F.3d 1293, 1296 (10th Cir. 2013), and this court takes a “restrictive view” of what constitutes a constitutional claim or question of law, id. at 1295. Gutierrez neither counters th e agency’s jurisdictional argument nor presents a constitutional claim or question of law at issue. The voluntary departure determination is outside our purview. III. Conclusion We deny the petition for review of the re moval order. We dismiss the petition for review of the di scretionary decision on voluntary departure for lack of jurisdiction.