Opinion ID: 774878
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Congress Acts

Text: 34 During the pendency of petitioner's appeal to the Board, Congress in 1996 enacted IIRIRA. That Act added the following language to the definition of refugee 35 For purposes of determinations under this chapter, a person who has been forced to abort a pregnancy or to undergo involuntary sterilization, or who has been persecuted for failure or refusal to undergo such a procedure or for other resistance to a coercive population control program, shall be deemed to have been persecuted on account of political opinion, and a person who has a well founded fear that he or she will be forced to undergo such a procedure or subject to persecution for such failure, refusal, or resistance shall be deemed to have a well founded fear of persecution on account of political opinion. 36 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(42) (1994 & Supp. V 1999). 37 In making this change in the statute Congress had before it evidence that prompted it to act to change the law. This evidence was developed at congressional subcommittee hearings on the subject of coercive population control in China that were held in May, June, and July 1995. See Coercive Population Control in China: Hearings Before the Subcomm. on Int'l Operations & Human Rights of the House Comm. on Int'l Relations (Hearings), 104th Cong. (1995). The subcommittee chairman spread on the pages of the Congressional Record the findings derived from those hearings. 38 He noted that forced abortion and forced sterilization are among the most gruesome human rights violations, but that refugees fleeing such treatment from the People's Republic of China by coming to the United States had their asylum claims rejected by the INS. 142 Cong. Rec. 6008 (1996) (statement of Rep. Smith, Chair, House Subcomm. on Int'l Operations & Human Rights). These women were forced back to China because they were regarded as common criminals and treated accordingly. The INS, by adopting in 1994 a policy of denying asylum to those fleeing forced sterilization, had reversed a long-standing policy of granting asylum to such refugees, if they could prove a well-founded fear that they were subject to a violation of their fundamental human rights. Hearings, 104th Cong. 29 (statement of Rep. Smith). 39 The People's Republic of China has repeatedly cracked down on those who resist forced sterilization. It treats them as political and ideological criminals, and as enemies of the state. On that rationale, the PRC has inflicted harsh punishment on refugees who are returned, such as beatings and being sent to forced labor camps, and being sentenced to prison. 142 Cong. Rec. 6008-09. It was on this record that Congress amended the definition of refugee. 1 40 Following IIRIRA, the Board acknowledged that the Act retroactively superseded the view expressed in In re Chang, and held that an alien forced to undergo sterilization pursuant to a population control program should be deemed to have suffered past persecution on account of political opinion and was thereby entitled to the regulatory presumption of a well-founded fear of future persecution. See In re X-P-T-, 21 I. & N. Dec. 634, 1996 WL 727127, 1996 BIA LEXIS 38, at  (BIA Dec. 18, 1996). The next year the Board ruled in In re C-Y-Z- that an alien can establish past persecution and become entitled to the presumption of a well-founded fear of future persecution if he can show that his spouse was forced to undergo sterilization. 1997 BIA LEXIS 25, at -10, 12. These amended administrative standards were in effect when the Board ruled on petitioner's appeal and his motion to reconsider in 1998 and 1999 respectively. IV Denial of Petitioner's Motion 41 Zhao's motion to reopen his case was denied on the ground that evidence of the radioactive dye tests could have been presented at the exclusion hearing. That decision by the Board may be reversed only upon our finding that it abused its discretion. INS v. Abudu, 485 U.S. 94, 104-05 (1988). An abuse of discretion may be found in those circumstances where the Board's decision provides no rational explanation, inexplicably departs from established policies, Douglas v. INS, 28 F.3d 241, 243 (2d Cir. 1994), is devoid of any reasoning, or contains only summary or conclusory statements, Anderson, 953 F.2d at 806; that is to say, where the Board has acted in an arbitrary or capricious manner. 42 In taking issue with the denial of his motion, Zhao contends the decision was arbitrary because with respect to the question of whether his wife was sterilized, the Board stated the Immigration Judge so found. Yet, it further ruled his application could not be buttress[ed] with the results of radioactive dye tests that the Board concluded could have been conducted earlier and presented at the exclusion hearing. Once the Board recognized his wife's sterilization, petitioner insists, it was obliged to apply IIRIRA and the holding of In re C-Y-Z -. 43 Respondents, including the Board, believe petitioner is reading the Board's language out of context. First, they describe the immigration judge's decision as simply reciting what petitioner had asserted at the hearing, without actually determining whether Zhao's wife was in fact sterilized. Second, insofar as the Board stated that petitioner's wife was already sterilized at the time of the 1994 hearing, respondents consider the Board to have ruled only that the radioactive dye tests did not relate to new matter because petitioner had submitted evidence and testified to her sterilization at the hearing. 44 For all of the reasons that follow, no matter how one construes the Board's reference to what the immigration judge found at the exclusion hearing, it was an abuse of discretion to deny petitioner's motion to reopen. A. Accepting Petitioner's Interpretation 45 The plain meaning of the language used to deny Zhao's motion supports his argument that the Board was recognizing a finding of fact. If the Board were to have considered the fact of sterilization established, then, because it was explicitly crediting petitioner's testimony and evidence on this point for the first time, the Board should have explained why Zhao's case would not be reopened in light of In re C-Y-Z-. That case and this are very similar -- much more so than the Board acknowledges -- and in In re C-Y-Z-, both asylum and withholding of deportation were conditionally granted. 46 In re C-Y-Z- involved a claim for asylum based on China's family planning policy. 1997 BIA LEXIS 25, at . The applicant testified that after the birth of his third child, his wife was forced to undergo sterilization. Id. at . In support of that testimony, the applicant submitted unauthenticated copies of a certificate that his wife was sterilized, a document showing that he was fined, a marriage certificate, birth certificates for his children and a copy of his household registry. Id. Similarly, in the case at hand, petitioner testified that his wife was sterilized against her will in 1989 following the birth of their second son, and to support that claim submitted his marriage certificate, a registration card indicating his wife underwent tubal ligation and his household registration booklet. 47 The immigration judge in In re C-Y-Z- explicitly avoided making a credibility determination about whether the applicant was telling the truth, lying or embellishing the facts. Id. at . Rather, the judge observed that the applicant and his wife had the children they wanted despite roadblocks put up by the Chinese government, including a threat of arrest and a one-day detention, the imposition of a fine and an order for an abortion that caused the couple to go into hiding. Id. With respect to the testimony that the applicant's wife was forcibly sterilized, the Board noted that the immigration judge never explicitly recognized that claim as fact, but instead referenced petitioner's assertions in conjectural terms such as, 'if indeed she was forced to undergo an involuntary sterilization' and 'alleged adverse factors... including forced sterilization.' (emphases added). Id. at -5. 48 The immigration judge's decision with respect to Zhao is similar. The immigration judge believed petitioner had suffered little in China as a result of having two children. Petitioner also relies on the language used in the decision on the motion to reopen to argue that the Board thought the immigration judge found petitioner's wife was sterilized. 49 Such a finding would not be at odds with the judge's adverse credibility determination. A close look at the immigration judge's decision reveals Zhao was found not credible because the focus of his testimony differed from the focus of his application for asylum and withholding of deportation, and that in turn differed from the reason he gave for entering the United States when questioned in Hawaii. The immigration judge thought Zhao's testimony lacked rationale and internal consistency, in addition to being quite general in nature and not sufficiently detailed to provide a plausible, coherent account for his fear. With regard to whether petitioner had a well-founded fear of persecution upon return to China, the immigration judge observed that he found no direct, credible, and specific evidence either that petitioner possessed a belief that a persecutor would seek to overcome by punishment or that such official had the inclination to punish petitioner. 50 In other words, the immigration judge's decision can be read as not passing on the truthfulness of the testimony, but rather faulting petitioner for inconsistency and generality. See Zhang v. Reno, 27 F. Supp. 2d 476, 476-77 & n.1 (S.D.N.Y. 1998) (granting habeas petition where immigration judge's adverse credibility finding rested on failure to raise sterilization claim in initial statement to INS, without regard to truthfulness of petitioner's testimony, given that extant law did not recognize such a claim). To the extent the Board in our case may have considered the immigration judge to have found petitioner's wife was sterilized, petitioner's credibility cannot be disparaged as a whole. Since petitioner stated at the exclusion hearing that his wife underwent such a procedure, the registration card for the family planning policy showed the same, and the language used by the Board implies it is willing to accept such a finding on the part of the immigration judge, logic would dictate that petitioner was truthful at least in some aspect of his testimony. For this reason, respondents' declaration that nothing in the motion to reopen overcame the adverse credibility determination made by the immigration judge and accepted by the Board on direct appeal rings hollow. 51 Finally, the INS in In re C-Y-Z- urged that asylum be denied because the applicant submitted unauthenticated documents, the immigration judge questioned the applicant's need to leave China and observed that the harm inflicted did not impact the applicant directly, and no evidence showed the alleged sterilization was ordered against the wishes of the applicant or his wife. 1997 BIA LEXIS 25, at -9. Respondents on this appeal in the same way emphasize that petitioner's registration card for the family planning policy, which indicates his wife underwent an oviduct ligation, was never authenticated in accordance with applicable regulations. They further aver that while this card and the radioactive dye tests show a sterilization procedure was performed, the papers fail to show such procedure was coerced. But these arguments were not only never raised before the Board -- due to the failure of the INS to submit opposition papers to petitioner's motion, see 8 C.F.R. § 3.2(g)(3); Motions & Appeals, 61 Fed. Reg. at 18,905 -- but also must be viewed as carrying little or no weight in light of the Board's holding in In re C-Y-Z-. There, of course, the Board rejected similar contentions and held instead that the applicant had established eligibility for asylum by virtue of his wife's forced sterilization. Id. at . 52 Taking into account the many parallels with In re C-Y-Z-, if the Board in the instant case were to have accepted as fact that petitioner's wife was sterilized, then it abused its discretion by not reaching the same conclusion here as it did in In re C-Y-Z, or at least explaining why its decision was a permissible outcome despite In re C-Y-Z-. As we have previously held, application of agency standards in a plainly inconsistent manner across similar situations evinces such a lack of rationality as to be arbitrary and capricious. Vargas v. INS, 938 F.2d 358, 362 (2d Cir. 1991). B. Accepting the Board's Interpretation 53 On the other hand, the Board correctly notes that the transcript of the immigration judge's decision contains no explicit finding that Zhao's wife was sterilized. Although -- as indicated in the foregoing discussion -- the Board would not be precluded from recognizing such a finding, we accept for the moment the Board's argument that no finding was made. Yet, even under this interpretation, we think the Board abused its discretion. For if the Board were not acknowledging that petitioner's wife underwent a tubal ligation, then its reason for denying petitioner the opportunity for a second evidentiary hearing was inadequate. 54 Respondents point out that petitioner was required to show on his motion to reopen that the evidence sought to be offered was not available at his first hearing. 8 C.F.R. § 3.2(c)(1); Motions & Appeals, 61 Fed. Reg. at 18,905; see also Acevedo v. INS, 538 F.2d 918, 920 (2d Cir. 1976) (per curiam). They assert that absent an explanation as to why May 1998 was the first time the test results could have been obtained, petitioner failed to satisfy his burden of showing the test results' unavailability. 55 But respondents fail to account for the fact that the Board sua sponte converted Zhao's motion to reconsider to a motion to reopen. Although we have no quarrels with that conversion, we point out that the Board never afforded petitioner an opportunity to provide an explanation as to why the dye tests were not previously obtainable. Such an explanation is unnecessary with a motion to reconsider. See 8 C.F.R. § 3.2(b)(1); Motions & Appeals, 61 Fed. Reg. at 18,904. In failing to provide this opportunity, the Board then abused its discretion by summarily stating that the tests could have been conducted earlier and presented at the former hearing. 56 First, the relevance of the dye tests would not have been known or obvious at the time of petitioner's exclusion hearing. Both IIRIRA and In re C-Y-Z- became law years later. Thus, to fault petitioner for submitting the results after the denial of his appeal on the grounds that he could have submitted them earlier is to expect petitioner to possess to an unreasonable degree omniscient foresight of future law. Cf. In re X-G-W-, 1998 BIA LEXIS 18, at -9 (reopening case and applying changes in the asylum law affected after IIRIRA). 57 Second, the Board reasoned simply that since the alleged fact of sterilization was asserted in 1994, the test results could also have been presented in 1994. This reasoning would be more persuasive if the tests were conducted closer in time to the immigration judge's adverse ruling. Yet the tests were performed more than four years after the hearing. 58 Moreover, although the Board gives no explanation as to why it believed the tests were available earlier, it makes little sense to think petitioner waited to order the tests for some improper purpose, such as hoping to prolong his immigration proceedings and thereby his time in the United States. The regulations clearly provide that the filing of a motion to reopen or a motion to reconsider shall not stay the execution of any decision made in the case, but rather, a stay of deportation must be specifically granted. 8 C.F.R. § 3.2(f); Motions & Appeals, 61 Fed. Reg. at 18,905. Moreover, since [t]he Board has discretion to deny a motion to reopen even if the party moving has made out a prima facie case for relief, 8 C.F.R. § 3.2(a); Motions & Appeals, 61 Fed. Reg. at 18,904, the immigration system is structured to discourage aliens from waiting to put forth relevant evidence in the hopes of delaying or avoiding deportation. Recognizing that the regulations permit motions to reopen and motions to reconsider to be filed while an appeal to the Board is pending (i.e., before an order of exclusion or deportation becomes final), which are then converted to a motion to remand, see 8 C.F.R. § 3.2(b)(1) & (c)(4); Motions & Appeals, 61 Fed. Reg. at 18,904, 18,905, it would have been to petitioner's advantage to submit the test results earlier in time had they been available. 59 In light of these observations, the record as it exists demonstrates the degree to which the Board improperly engaged in speculation when it concluded that the tests on Zhao's wife could have been conducted at the time of the original hearing. See Anderson, 953 F.2d at 806. Although the burden rests first with petitioner to prove the evidence was not available and could not have been presented earlier, see 8 C.F.R. § 3.2(c)(1); Motions & Appeals, 61 Fed. Reg. at 18,905, we think under the specific circumstances of this case that the burden was met. Petitioner provided the dates of the tests with no chance to supplement his papers after his motion was converted to one to reopen. The INS never responded to the motion, thereby giving petitioner no notice that his evidence would be rejected as untimely. Nor have respondents offered on appeal any basis to believe the tests could have been done in 1994. Finally, the sequence of events lends support to petitioner. 60 Consequently if, upon remand, the Board explains that it never intended to recognize a finding of fact by the immigration judge, then petitioner must be granted a new hearing for the purpose of determining whether his wife was forcibly sterilized. Once that evidence is received, petitioner's case must be re-examined in light of In re C-Y-Z-, with a proper explanation as to how such precedent affects petitioner's case.