Opinion ID: 170955
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Petition of Mr. Vicente-Lopez

Text: As noted earlier, the BIA issued an opinion in Mr. Vicente-Lopez's case, so we review its decision. Moreover, the BIA issued its opinion here after it had clarified the standard for economic persecution in In re T-Z-. While the BIA did not refer specifically to In re T-Z-, it did not say anything to suggest that it was deviating from the standard it had recently taken pains to clarify. We therefore turn directly to the record and review whether the BIA's decision is supported by substantial evidence in light of In re T-Z-. The testimony about economic persecution here was weaker than it was in the case of Mr. Vicente-Elias. [7] Mr. Vicente-Lopez offered only generalities that were vague as to substance, scope of application, or both: he left Guatemala due to [t]he poverty, Admin. R. at 104; his family was poor, id. at 122; there is no money over there, id. at 110; there are people that are poor and the other ones, don't have clothes or shoes or anything, id. at 111; and we don't have any money, we don't have any clothes, [8] id. at 112. He also testified that he had only three years of school, but did not attribute that to economic necessity. Id. at 114. This testimony was insufficient to establish economic persecution and certainly would not compel a factfinder to resolve the matter in a manner contrary to the finding of the BIA. Mr. Vicente-Lopez admitted that no one ever harmed him, id. at 106, 108, but he did cite two incidents of physical harm to members of his family. He was told that his father had been sprayed in the eye with a toxic substance, causing a two to three week disability, for walking on property owned by Latinos. Id. at 106, 108-09, 121, 123-25. He also believes that his cousin was poisoned, though he does not know who did it or what happened (he speculated that it was because his cousin was poor). Id. at 110-12, 122. These incidents cannot support a claim of persecution, however, as the BIA found that Mr. Vicente-Lopez did not demonstrate that this harm was on account of a protected ground, particularly one related to [himself], id. at 25, and the scant factual record on the matter is plainly insufficient to compel a finding to the contrary. The only specific testimony about ethnic mistreatment was that members of Mr. Vicente-Lopez's family were subjected to verbal abuse, what he characterized as bad words, from Latinos. Id. at 108-10. Such conduct, though repugnant, is not a sufficient basis to compel a finding of persecution. Vatulev, 354 F.3d at 1210 ([E]thnic slurs ... are odious, but ... fall far short of what would compel a reasonable factfinder to [find] persecution.). Mr. Vicente-Lopez seeks to bolster his overall case for persecution with a pattern or practice argument much like that advanced by Mr. Vicente-Elias, which fails for similar reasons. Mr. Vicente-Lopez also includes in his briefing a general account of the Guatemalan civil war similar to that given by Mr. Vicente-Elias, evidently to support humanitarian asylum. But, as Mr. Vicente-Lopez limited his petition for review to the denial of restriction on removal, [9] humanitarian asylum is simply not before us. Of course, if it were, our conclusion here would be no different than it was in Mr. Vicente-Elias's case. Finally, Mr. Vicente-Lopez asserts a fairly novel substantive due process claim: Do the massacres of the Mayans in Guatemala in [the] 1980's sponsored by the United States shock the conscience and therefore require relief in this case? Aplt. Opening Br. at 75. He did not raise this claim to the BIA. Because aliens must, under 8 U.S.C. § 1252(d)(1), exhaust their administrative remedies, we generally assert jurisdiction only over those arguments that [an alien] properly presents to the BIA. Sidabutar v. Gonzales, 503 F.3d 1116, 1118 (10th Cir.2007). But § 1252(d)(1) requires exhaustion only of remedies available to the alien as of right. Thus, we have not required exhaustion of constitutional challenges to the immigration laws, because the BIA has no jurisdiction to review such claims. Akinwunmi v. INS, 194 F.3d 1340, 1341 (10th Cir.1999) (per curiam). Indeed, it is more broadly recognized that the BIA lacks authority to resolve constitutional questions as a general matter and, hence, that this exhaustion exception extends to constitutional issues per se. See, e.g., Tall v. Mukasey, 517 F.3d 1115, 1120 (9th Cir. 2008); Colaianni v. INS, 490 F.3d 185, 187 (2d Cir.2007) (per curiam); Kokar v. Gonzales, 478 F.3d 803, 808 (7th Cir.2007); Geach v. Chertoff, 444 F.3d 940, 945 (8th Cir.2006). The only caveat is that objections to procedural errors or defects that the BIA could have remedied must be exhausted even if the alien later attempts to frame them in terms of constitutional due process on judicial review. Tall, 517 F.3d at 1120; Kokar, 478 F.3d at 808; Geach, 444 F.3d at 945; see Soberanes v. Comfort, 388 F.3d 1305, 1309 (10th Cir. 2004) (quoting Akinwunmi ). Thus, it appears Mr. Vicente-Lopez's substantive due process claimwhich does not challenge an administratively correctable procedural defect but, rather, asserts a substantive constitutional claim for relief independent of the statutory provisions the BIA is authorized to enforceis not subject to the exhaustion bar. Mr. Vicente-Lopez attempts to premise this claim on the state created danger or danger creation theory recognized as a basis for substantive due process claims in actions against state officers under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. See generally Christiansen v. City of Tulsa, 332 F.3d 1270, 1279-82 (10th Cir.2003); Armijo ex rel. Chavez v. Wagon Mound Pub. Sch., 159 F.3d 1253, 1262 (10th Cir.1998). In essence, he argues that adverse conditions in an alien's home country attributed to foreign policy actions of the U.S. government are the equivalent of domestic state-created dangers in the § 1983 context, and that a prohibition on the alien's removal (where removal would otherwise be proper under immigration law) should be imposed on the government as an equitable remedy. Similar efforts to extend the state created danger theory to the context of immigration review, and thereby judicially engraft a new form of relief from removal onto the statutory scheme established by Congress, have been squarely rejected by two other circuits. See Enwonwu v. Gonzales, 438 F.3d 22, 29-31 (1st Cir.2006); Kamara v. Att'y Gen., 420 F.3d 202, 216-18 (3d Cir.2005). These cases are soundly reasoned, and we follow their lead here. For the above reasons, we discern no error in the BIA's determination that Mr. Vicente-Lopez failed to qualify for restriction on removal. The petitions for review in both of these matters are DENIED. Petitioners' motions to proceed in forma pauperis are GRANTED. Mr. Vicente-Elias's motion to file an oversized reply brief is GRANTED.