21-1195-cv

Velez v. Cuomo

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE SECOND CIRCUIT

SUMMARY ORDER

RULINGS BY SUMMARY ORDER DO NOT HAVE PRECEDENTIAL EFFECT. CITATION TO A SUMMARY 

ORDER FILED ON OR AFTER JANUARY 1, 2007, IS PERMITTED AND IS GOVERNED BY FEDERAL RULE OF 

APPELLATE PROCEDURE 32.1 AND THIS COURT’S LOCAL RULE 32.1.1. WHEN CITING A SUMMARY ORDER 

IN A DOCUMENT FILED WITH THIS COURT, A PARTY MUST CITE EITHER THE FEDERAL APPENDIX OR AN 

ELECTRONIC DATABASE (WITH THE NOTATION “SUMMARY ORDER”). A PARTY CITING TO A SUMMARY 

ORDER MUST SERVE A COPY OF IT ON ANY PARTY NOT REPRESENTED BY COUNSEL. 

1 At a stated term of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, 

2 held at the Thurgood Marshall United States Courthouse, 40 Foley Square, in the City of 

New York, on the 29th 3 day of March, two thousand twenty-two.

4

5 PRESENT:

6 BARRINGTON D. PARKER,

7 MICHAEL H. PARK,

8 BETH ROBINSON,

9 Circuit Judges.

10 _____________________________________

11

12 BIANCA VELEZ, MOMMY’S ME TIME,

13

14 Plaintiff-Appellant,

15

16 v. 21-1195

17

18 GOVERNOR ANDREW CUOMO, 

19 MAYOR BILL DE BLASIO, GAVIN 

20 NEWSOM, GOVERNOR OF 

21 CALIFORNIA, JAY INSLEE, 

22 GOVERNOR OF WASHINGTON, 

23 GRETCHEN WHITMORE, GOVERNOR 

24 OF MICHIGAN, TONY EVERS, 

25 GOVERNOR OF WISCONSIN, TOM 

26 WOLF, GOVERNOR OF 

27 PENNSYLVANIA,

28

29 Defendants-Appellees.

30 _____________________________________

31

32 FOR PLAINTIFF-APPELLANT: Bianca Velez, pro se,

33 Lakeland, FL.

34

35 FOR DEFENDANTS-APPELLEES: No appearance.
2

1 Appeal from a judgment of the United States District Court for the Northern District of 

2 New York (Sharpe, J.).

3 UPON DUE CONSIDERATION, IT IS HEREBY ORDERED, ADJUDGED, AND 

4 DECREED that the judgment of the district court is AFFIRMED.

5 Bianca Velez, a Florida resident proceeding pro se, brought suit under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 

6 against the Mayor of New York City, the Governor of New York, and the governors of several 

7 other states (“Defendants”), purportedly challenging those jurisdictions’ COVID-19-related 

8 orders. A magistrate judge issued a Report and Recommendation (“R&R”) recommending 

9 dismissal with leave to amend based on Velez’s failure to allege standing to sue and to present a 

10 clear statement of her claims under the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. The district court adopted 

11 the R&R. Velez then filed an amended complaint alleging that Defendants had engaged in general 

12 corruption and unlawful conduct in connection with allegedly unconstitutional COVID-19-related 

13 policies. The magistrate judge issued another R&R, recommending dismissal on the same grounds 

14 as before. Velez filed a purported second amended complaint but no objections to the R&R. 

15 Thereafter, the district court adopted the R&R, dismissed the first amended complaint, construed 

16 the new filing as a motion for leave to amend, and denied that motion because the previously 

17 identified errors had not been cured in the proposed pleading. We assume the parties’ familiarity 

18 with the underlying facts, the procedural history of the case, and the issues on appeal.

19 Velez has failed to raise any arguments before this Court that meaningfully challenge the 

20 basis for the district court’s decisions below. Although we “liberally construe pleadings and briefs 

21 submitted by pro se litigants, reading such submissions to raise the strongest arguments they 

22 suggest,” McLeod v. Jewish Guild for the Blind, 864 F.3d 154, 156 (2d Cir. 2017) (citation

23 omitted), pro se appellants must still comply with Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 28(a), 
3

1 which “requires appellants in their briefs to provide the court with a clear statement of the issues 

2 on appeal,” Moates v. Barkley, 147 F.3d 207, 209 (2d Cir. 1998). Thus, despite affording pro se 

3 litigants “some latitude in meeting the rules governing litigation,” we “normally will not[] decide 

4 issues that a party fails to raise in his or her appellate brief.” Moates, 147 F.3d at 209; see also 

5 Terry v. Inc. Village of Patchogue, 826 F.3d 631, 632–33 (2d Cir. 2016) (“Although we accord 

6 filings from pro se litigants a high degree of solicitude, even a litigant representing himself is 

7 obliged to set out identifiable arguments in his principal brief.” (cleaned up)). And we do not 

8 normally entertain challenges to district court rulings where the “substance of the . . . ruling” is 

9 mentioned only “obliquely and in passing.” Gerstenbluth v. Credit Suisse Secs. (USA) LLC, 728 

10 F.3d 139, 142 n.4 (2d Cir. 2013); see also Norton v. Sam’s Club, 145 F.3d 114, 117 (2d Cir. 1998) 

11 (“Issues not sufficiently argued in the briefs are considered waived and normally will not be 

12 addressed on appeal.”).

13 Nowhere in her brief does Velez challenge the district court’s reasoning that dismissal was 

14 appropriate because she failed to establish standing to sue or to provide a clear statement of her 

15 claims. Rather, she simply expounds upon her broad allegations that Defendants “were attacking 

16 civil rights and liberties with legitimate lies and false claims deceiving the nation and breaching 

17 the public trust with felonious acts of deprivations of rights under the color of law.” Appellant’s 

18 Br. at 6. By not arguing that the district court erred in dismissing her complaint or in construing 

19 her second amended complaint as a motion for leave to amend and denying it, she has waived any 

20 challenge to the district court’s order on appeal. 

21 We have considered all of Velez’s remaining arguments and find them to be without merit. 

22 Accordingly, we AFFIRM the judgment of the district court.

23 FOR THE COURT: 

24 Catherine O=Hagan Wolfe, Clerk of Court