PUBLISH UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE TENTH CIRCUIT

________________ _________________ MARCUS D. WOODSON, Plaintiff - Appellant,

v. TRACY McCOLLUM; BRUCE BORNHIEM, in their individual capacities; JOE ALLBAUGH, in his official and individual capacities; GREG WILLIAMS; BRENDA GOODSON; KERRY KENDALL; SHEILA PHILLIPS; AMBER SWIFT; SAM PRESTON; CARL BEAR; JASON BRYANT; KRISTIN TIMS; DR. TROUT; CASEY HAMILTON; HELEN BELL; MIKE ROGE RS; LINDA MONK; FNU CALLINS; DE NNIS HENDRIX; CHIEF TATE; SHERRY DECAMP; WARDEN DAVID PARKER; JENETTA ORR; DARREN GIPSON; LAWRENCE BELL; BRUCE KIETEL; WILLIAM WELDON; BARBIE RO UNDSVILLE, in their individual capacities, Defendants - Appellees. No. 17-6064

________________ _________________ Appeal from the United States District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma (D.C. No. 5:17-CV-00094-D)

________________ _________________ Submitted on the briefs: *

* 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 FILED United States Court of Appeals Tenth Circuit 

### November 20, 2017
Elisabeth A. Shumaker Clerk of Court2 Amir H. Ali, Roderick & Solange MacArt hur Justice Center, Washington, D.C., for Plaintiff-Appellant. Stefanie E. Lawson, Assistant Attorney Gene ral, Oklahoma Attorney General’s Office, Litigation Division, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, for Defe ndants-Appellees.

________________ _________________ Before HARTZ , McKAY , and MATHESON , Circuit Judges.

________________ _________________ HARTZ , Circuit Judge.

________________ _________________ Plaintiff Marcus Woodson is a prisoner of the State of Oklahoma. He sued several prison officials in Ok lahoma state court, proceeding in forma pauperis (IFP) under state law. The defenda nts removed the case to the Un ited States District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma. As required by fede ral statute, they paid the filing fee. See 28 U.S.C. § 1914(a) (“The parties instituting any civil action . . . whether by original process, removal or otherwise” are require d to pay the filing fee. (emphasis added)). The federal court, how ever, determined that Woodson, who had previously abused the federal courts by fi ling frivolous lawsuits, was not eligible to proceed IFP and dismissed his case because he failed to pay the filing fee. Woodson appeals. Exercising jurisd iction under 28 U.S.C. §1291, we reverse. State-court plaintiffs whose cases are re moved to federal court have no obligation to pay a filing fee; nothing in the federal IFP st atute is to the contrary. I. The Federal IFP Statute 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.3 Congress enacted the federal IFP statute, 28 U.S.C. § 191 5, to ensure that the poor could take legal ac tion despite their inability to pay court fees. See Coleman v. Tollefson , 135 S. Ct. 1759, 1761 ( 2015). The statute allows courts to “authorize the commencement . . . of any su it . . . without prepayment of fees” if a person files an affidavit stating, among othe r things, that he “is unable to pay such fees.” § 1915(a)(1). But litigants who do not prepay fees have less economic incentive to refrain from filing frivolous lawsuits. See Coleman , 135 S. Ct. at 1762. “Congress came to see that prisoner suits in pa rticular represented a dispro portionate share of federal filings.” Id . It therefore passed the Prison Litigation Reform Act of 1995, which included several measures “des igned to prevent sportive fi lings in federal court.” Skinner v. Switzer , 562 U.S. 521, 535 (2011). One such provision is the three-strikes rule in § 1915(g), which excl udes prisoners who file frequent frivolous lawsuits from the benefits of IFP status. See id. ; Childs v. Miller , 713 F.3d 1262, 1265 (10th Cir. 2013). It states: In no event shall a prisoner bring a ci vil action or appeal a judgment in a civil action or proceeding under this se ction [§ 1915] if the prisoner has, on 3 or more occasions, while incarcer ated or detained in any facility, brought an action or appeal in a c ourt of the United States that was dismissed on the grounds th at it is frivolous, malici ous, or fails to state a claim upon which relief may be gran ted, unless the prisoner is under imminent danger of se rious physical injury. § 1915(g). A state court is not a “court of the United Stat es” as defined for Title 28 of the United States Code. See 28 U.S.C. § 451 (“The term ‘court of the United States’ includes the Supreme C ourt of the United States, c ourts of appeal, district4 courts constituted by chapter 5 of this ti tle, . . . and any cour t created by Act of Congress the judges of which are entitled to hold office during good behavior.”). The three-strikes rule does not totally bar prisoners with three strikes from filing lawsuits; it just makes them pay the filing fee as any other plaintiff. See White v. Colorado , 157 F.3d 1226, 1233 ( 10th Cir. 1988). In this case the defendants paid the federal filing fee, so Woodson did not seek to proceed IFP. 1 Nevertheless, the district court ruled that § 1915(g) required him to pay a filing fee because he ha s had three prior lawsuits di smissed on the grounds that they were frivolous, mali cious, or failed to stat e a claim, and he did not qualify for the exception for prisoners who are in “imminent danger of se rious physical injury.” 28 U.S.C. § 1915(g). 2 It therefore dism issed his case. II. Analysis We review de novo the district c ourt’s interpretation of § 1915(g). See Scanlon White, Inc. v. C.I.R. , 472 F.3d 1173, 1175 ( 10th Cir. 2006) (“The interpretation of a federal statute is a question of law which this court reviews de

novo .” (internal quotation mark s omitted)). We begin by observing that nothing in the statutory language authorizes th e district court’s dismissal. See Coleman , 135 S. Ct. at 1763 (focusing on “the plain langua ge of the statute” when interpreting § 1915(g)). Section 1915(g) applies to prisoners with three strikes who “ bring a civil

1 Woodson paid this court’s filing fee, so he does not seek to proceed IFP on appeal either.

2 Woodson does not challenge the district court’s findings that he has three strikes and failed to meet th e imminent-danger exception.5 action . . . under this section .” § 1915(g) (emphasis a dded). We doubt a prisoner could “bring” an action by filing a case in state court only to have it removed to federal court. See Harris v. Mangum , 863 F.3d 1133, 1141 (9th Cir. 2017) (“When a defendant removes a case from st ate to federal court, it cannot be said that a prisonerplaintiff was the one who bro ught the case in fe deral court.”). But regardless, a prisoner certainly does not bring an action “ under this section” when he does not seek to proceed IFP under § 1915. We agree with the only circuit-court opini on we have found that discusses the
matter. In Harris v. Mangum , 863 F.3d at 1140–41, the Ninth Circuit considered whether a prisoner could be charged with a st rike after the district court dismissed an action the defendants removed from state court. In holding that the dismissal did not count as a strike, the court said: Section 1915(g) prevents a prisoner with three strikes from filing a case in federal court without prepaying the filing fee, but [the plaintiff] did not file this case in federal cour t, and he was not required to pay a federal court filing fee. Defendants were the parties who brought this case to federal court when they rem oved it from state court, and it was their responsibility to pay the federal fili ng fee, as they did in this case. The statute does not prevent an indi gent prisoner-plaintiff with three strikes from proceeding in a case th at someone else filed in federal court. Id

. Nor is the policy purpose of § 1915(g) subverted by allowing this suit to proceed without Woodson’s paying a filing fee. The three-strikes rule is to deter prisoners from filing me ritless lawsuits in federal court. See Skinner , 562 U.S. at 535. It was not offended by Woodson’s pursuing a claim IFP in the Oklahoma6 courts. That state is free to set less stringent constr aints on prisoner litigation. See Abdul-Akbar v. McKelvie , 239 F.3d 307, 314-15 (3d Ci r. 2001) (recognizing that prisoners ineligible to proceed IFP under § 1915(g) “may seek relief in state court, where limitations on filing I.F. P. may not be as strict” a nd stating that “[p]otentially negative consequences in federal courts, as distinguished from state courts, are precisely the consequen ces intended by Congress”); Wilson v. Yaklich , 148 F.3d 596, 605 (6th Cir. 1998) (noting that while § 1915(g) barred the plaintiff from proceeding IFP in federal court, he could still “litig ate his federal constitutional causes of action in forma pauperis in state court”). And it was not Woodson who sought the federal forum. He did not choose to burden th e federal courts; the defendants did. III. Conclusion We reverse the district court’s order dismissing Woodson’s claims under § 1915(g) and remand for proceedings consistent with this opinion.