Opinion ID: 3161540
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Mental Limitations and Unskilled Work

Text: We begin with Ms. Kearns’s argument that the RFC and the hypothetical question posed to the VE were deficient because a limitation to “unskilled work” does not account for her work-related mental limitations—namely, her bipolar I disorder, PTSD, and borderline personality, which were identified as severe impairments at step two. Ms. Kearns conflates the RFC’s reference to her ability to “follow simple routine instructions” with the limitation to “unskilled work,” Aplt. App., Vol. I at 40, and inaccurately characterizes the RFC as a limitation to “simple work,” e.g., Aplt. Principal Br. at 6, 9. Nevertheless, we understand her point to be that an ALJ cannot speak solely in terms of skill level in his RFC and hypothetical question to the VE because “if [the claimant’s] mental impairments are affecting her, it will not matter how much skill is required in her specific job—her mental impairments will prevent any work,” id. at 7. 4 We agree with the Commissioner that Ms. Kearns waived this argument because it was absent from her initial brief to the district court and first surfaced in her objections to the magistrate judge’s report and recommendation. “In this circuit, theories raised for the first time in objections to the magistrate judge’s report are deemed waived.” United States v. Garfinkle, 261 F.3d 1030, 1031 (10th Cir. 2001).1 Of course, an argument that was never raised before the district court is also waived. Wilburn v. Mid-South Health Dev., Inc., 343 F.3d 1274, 1280 (10th Cir. 2003). This is the case with Ms. Kearns’s newly presented argument that the jobs suggested by the VE do not fit the hypothetical question because they involve detailed work. 1 Ms. Kearns attempts to avert waiver through two alternative contentions, neither of which has merit. See Aplt. Reply Br. at 1–3. First, she asserts this issue was encompassed within her argument to the district court that the RFC did not contain sufficiently specific terms. See Aplt. App., Vol. III at 591–92. But there, Ms. Kearns critiqued the ALJ’s use of the word “superficial” in describing her “ability to interact appropriately on a superficial work basis with coworkers and supervisors”—an entirely separate issue from an ALJ’s ability or inability to adequately address a claimant’s mental impairments through a limitation to unskilled work. Second, Ms. Kearns argues it was temporally impossible to present this issue in the initial brief to the district court because her position stems from our unpublished opinion in Jaramillo v. Colvin, 576 F. App’x 870 (10th Cir. 2014), which was released shortly after she filed that initial brief. But the citations in her appellate briefs date back to 1996, demonstrating that Jaramillo was not the first word on this issue. E.g., Chapo v. Astrue, 682 F.3d 1285 (10th Cir. 2012); Wayland v. Chater, 76 F.3d 394 (10th Cir. 1996) (unpublished table decision). The same is true for Ms. Kearns’s parallel argument that the hypothetical question posed to the VE was deficient, an issue we also discussed in Chapo, 682 F.3d at 1290 & n.3. And Ms. Kearns again cites decades-old cases in support of her position. E.g., Evans v. Chater, 55 F.3d 530 (10th Cir. 1995); Hargis v. Sullivan, 945 F.2d 1482 (10th Cir. 1991). 5