Opinion ID: 6349253
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Our Court’s Replacement of Extraordinary

Text: Deference with an Imposing Edifice of Lopsided Immigration Precedents The three nested tiers of deference just discussed reinforce one another when we properly apply the substantial evidence test and ask only if the record compels a contrary conclusion. Viewed synergistically, (1) our extraordinarily deferential standard of review, carried out with (2) a recognition that we are reviewing inherently indeterminate and fact-intensive questions, in light of (3) the wide range of discretion Congress has given the agency in answering these difficult inquiries, should combine to present one of the most deferential standards of review we apply as judges. But not in the Ninth Circuit. Our failure to defer begets more (and worsening) failures to defer, as our court keeps relying on its own distorted immigration precedent to justify a downward spiral. Every once in a while, the Supreme Court corrects us in a decision like Dai, where anyone with any common sense (including the unanimous Supreme Court) wonders how we could have strayed so far afield from our statutory mandate. But like a meandering elephant being smacked with a flyswatter, our court lumbers on. Unaffected by the occasional reversal, our ever-growing pile of perfidious immigration precedents make it harder and harder for judges to properly defer to the agency without seemingly conflicting with some precedent (while still following other discredited “deemed-credible-or-true” approach under a different guise. As my dissent explains, reviewing agency determinations as to what facts constitute persecution for substantial evidence is the only practical way of effectuating the Supreme Court’s instructions in Dai and not substituting judges’ own weighing of the factual record for the agency’s. FLORES MOLINA V. GARLAND 43 precedent—more on that below). The mechanics of how this works merits further elaboration. Despite the importance of this highly deferential and narrow scope of review to which Congress has anchored us, our court simply cannot resist the sirens of sympathy. So we frequently set our discretion free from the constraints of this hyper-deferential regime and reverse the agency in favor of a more palatable result. Each time a panel breaks free from the INA’s anchor of deference, it publishes a precedential decision that elevates its own discretion over the agency’s. The first panel to do so erected a buoy of caselaw that is only a stone’s throw away from the statutory anchor that should have tied the panel to the agency’s decision and commanded deference. But the next panel, drawn again to the sirens of sympathy or the lure of its own discretion, no longer starts from the original anchor of deference that Congress set. It instead starts from the bobbing buoy of our last wayward precedent. The process is foreseeable and plays out once again in this case—the majority latches onto a handful of similar facts from previous panel decisions that overruled the agency, and now erects its own new buoy of precedent, just a little further out to sea for the next sympathetic panel to analogize to (and stray further from). Eventually we are surrounded by precedential buoys that make any decision to reverse the agency appear like just routine reliance on precedent, even if it means the INA’s statutory anchor of deference is by this point far out of sight. Unmoored from the extremely deferential standard of review Congress has tied us to, we are now essentially lost at sea in our review of agency immigration decisions and tend to grab onto the nearest buoys of friendly caselaw closest to our facts (irrespective of whether the prior precedent was properly deferential). This is not how our 44 FLORES MOLINA V. GARLAND “extremely” deferential standard of review should work. We should remain anchored to the standard of review Congress has dictated, and under that deferential regime I cannot say the record compels a different result with respect to Molina’s claims here. Instead of respecting our deferential role and looking for ways to affirm agency decisions, our court has covered over the statutory standard of review with a common-law edifice of our own precedent that continues to obfuscate what proper application of the INA’s substantial evidence review should look like. This case follows and perpetuates the trend I’ve described. The majority recounts the standard of review, but then purports to follow it by cherry-picking immigration cases that justify its interpretation and preferred weight of the evidence (i.e., that Molina’s past harms amount to persecution). The mostly unspoken reality—because our court maintains a large immigration docket and sometimes applies the deferential standard but often does not—is that for the facts of almost any immigration case there is usually somewhat “analogous” precedent that supports both denying and granting the petition. Justice Scalia’s oft-cited concerns with respect to the indeterminate use of legislative history aptly apply in this context—that our huge court’s inconsistent application of the deferential standard of review has resulted in immigration precedent that offers a little “something for everybody.” ANTONIN SCALIA, A MATTER OF INTERPRETATION 36 (1997). Given that reality, judges can point to our precedent as justification for either result. The majority here analogizes to precedent that it argues shows the agency erred. But as I demonstrate below, our court’s precedents (including those cited by the BIA) can be just as easily applied to support the agency’s decision. Of course, in this situation—and in light of our extremely FLORES MOLINA V. GARLAND 45 deferential standard of review—a tie should go to the agency. But it often doesn’t in our court. One problem exacerbating this troubling trend is that decisions from our court that properly defer to the agency are usually resolved in unpublished dispositions with no precedential value. See, e.g., Islam v. Sessions, 743 Fed. App’x 734, 736 (9th Cir. 2018) (finding, in an unpublished disposition, that the petitioner’s past harm, including a beating and threats similar to what Molina suffered, “d[id] not evince actions so severe as to compel a finding of past persecution,” and that the petitioner failed to establish a well-founded fear of future persecution because he failed to show a “reasonable possibility” of persecution) (citing Hoxha v. Ashcroft, 319 F.3d 1179, 1182 (9th Cir. 2003)). By contrast, decisions granting the petition by extending prior precedents are typically published. So even if one was inclined to engage in this inappropriate game of picking friendly precedents from a crowded and diverse room, the game is rigged and lopsided against proper deference. 4 Looking to our circuit’s enormous, slanted edifice of deviant immigration precedents perpetuates our court’s regretful trend of granting ourselves massive discretion instead of granting massive deference to the agency. The 4 It shouldn’t matter much for purposes of precedent whether a circuit decision ruling on behalf of the BIA is published or not. The proper question is whether this record compels a result different than the agency’s. And if in a similar case the panel concluded that the record did not compel a different result, that conclusion—whether published or not—is a strong indication that this record also does not compel otherwise. The very fact that two or more judges previously reached that conclusion in a comparable case is powerful evidence that the REAL ID Act’s high standard hasn’t been met, whether or not the previous decision is technically binding on subsequent panels. 46 FLORES MOLINA V. GARLAND remnants of our overturned Dai decision, and other clearly wrong and manufactured rules that we have etched into this edifice, echo throughout our caselaw, blatantly favoring immigration relief and disguising our disdain for the properly deferential role that Congress prescribed because we can always say we are just following (or slightly extending) precedent. We cite the obligatory deferential language at the beginning of each new recalcitrant opinion, masquerading as if we’re being deferential even though we’re not. Deference to our own precedents? I suppose. But not to the agency’s discretion that Congress has authorized it to exercise and commanded that we defer to. Unfortunately, this case will no doubt be another layer in our leaning tower of precedents, encouraging further future deviation from our properly deferential role. II. ANALYSIS A. Proper Deference in This Case In this case, proper deference requires the panel to resist reweighing the evidence (i.e., giving greater weight to Molina’s claimed past harms in order to find they amount to past persecution) and resist cherry-picking precedent to justify a conclusion that, even if reasonable, is not compelled by the record. Because, in applying the three-nested tiers of deference described above, I cannot say the record before us compels a contrary conclusion, I would affirm the agency’s decision to dismiss Molina’s asylum claim. The agency’s decision to deny Molina’s asylum claim centered on his failure to demonstrate past persecution. Navas v. INS, 217 F.3d 646, 655–56 (9th Cir. 2000) (“In order to establish eligibility for asylum on the basis of past persecution, an applicant must show: (1) an incident, or incidents, that rise to the level of persecution; (2) that is on FLORES MOLINA V. GARLAND 47 account of one of the statutorily-protected grounds; and (3) is committed by the government or forces the government is either unable or unwilling to control.”) (quotation marks omitted). The difficulty of reviewing agency determinations on credibility, weight, and persuasiveness—and the consequences of not properly deferring to those determinations—is well-illustrated here. There is no formula for how much weight or persuasive value to give Molina’s testimony that six hooded assailants threatened his life after giving him a bruised lip, and no formula for how much to discount his fear of future persecution in light of the evidence that conditions in Nicaragua seemed to be improving when the agency considered this case. In accordance with Dai, we must recognize that the absence of an adverse credibility determination does not mean that the agency also gave full weight and persuasive value to Molina’s testimony. The majority’s decision does not recognize or allow for this possibility, and instead implicitly assumes that because Molina’s testimony was found to be consistent, the agency must have also accorded full weight and persuasive value to his testimony on past harms.
Harms Evince Past Persecution. Persecution is “an extreme concept that does not include every sort of treatment our society regards as offensive.” Duran-Rodriguez v. Barr, 918 F.3d 1025, 1028 (9th Cir. 2019) (quoting Nagoulko v. INS, 333 F.3d 1012, 1016 (9th Cir. 2003)). Whether harm rises to the level of persecution necessarily requires weighing the evidence—a task only the agency is authorized to complete. Similarly, whether threats like the kind Molina received rise to the level of persecution (considering how direct, severe, repeated, etc.) is also a core 48 FLORES MOLINA V. GARLAND function of the agency because it requires weighing the evidence. 5 In the agency’s shoes, I may have allocated more weight to the harm Molina experienced and found that he suffered past persecution, or a well-founded fear of future persecution. But the evidence does not allow for only that view, as the majority claims. These fact-bound inquiries involve judgment calls that only the agency can make and we cannot reweigh the evidence as my colleagues in the majority have implicitly done here. See Guo v. Sessions, 897 F.3d 1208, 1212 (9th Cir. 2018); see also Leon- Hernandez v. INS, 926 F.2d 902, 904 (9th Cir. 1991).
Deference The majority identifies three bases for its conclusion that Molina’s past experiences amount to persecution: (1) he was forced to flee; (2) he received death threats; and (3) cumulatively, the effect of those incidents amount to persecution. With respect to the first two bases, as is often true, we have caselaw pointing in both directions, making the majority’s conclusion possible but not compelled since there are also circuit precedents evincing that threats combined with a minor assault are not enough to compel a finding of persecution. As to the third basis of the majority’s decision, the agency explicitly conducted a cumulative 5 Sharma v. Garland, 9 F.4th 1052, 1061 (9th Cir. 2021) (“Determining whether the facts compel a conclusion of past persecution is ultimately a fact-bound endeavor that is not reducible to a set formula. . . . Under our cases, [relevant facts] must be evaluated in combination with each other to form a sufficiently negative portrait of the petitioner’s experience in his or her own country that not only allows a finding of past persecution but requires it.”). FLORES MOLINA V. GARLAND 49 review of the evidence, which requires our deference even if the majority disagrees with the result of that cumulative analysis.
As the majority correctly notes, our court has recognized that under certain circumstances “being forced to flee from one’s home in the face of an immediate threat of severe physical violence or death” can constitute persecution. Mendoza-Pablo v. Holder, 667 F.3d 1308, 1314 (9th Cir. 2012). But the circumstances in which our court has found that fleeing evidenced persecution were much more severe than those faced by Molina. For example, in MendozaPablo, the petitioner’s village was burned to the ground and its inhabitants massacred, including his immediate family members who were locked in their homes and burned alive—forcing his mother to flee to the mountains with him while eight-months pregnant. Id. at 1311–13. And in Knezevic, our court emphasized the “ethnic cleansing” that forced petitioner to flee after his home and business were destroyed while his hometown was shelled and bombarded by hostile forces. Knezevic v. Ashcroft, 367 F.3d 1206, 1208–12 (9th Cir. 2004). Mendoza-Pablo and Knezevic do not stand for the proposition that fleeing always, or even usually, constitutes persecution, and those cases cannot be read isolated from their extreme facts, which differ markedly from Molina’s decision to relocate. Molina chose to relocate after a threat was spray painted on his house, and later after paramilitary members came looking for him. But our precedent sets a higher bar for persecution, including in the cases cited by the majority on fleeing one’s home. The petitioners in Mendoza-Pablo and Knezevic fled their homes, because, unlike Molina, their homes were completely destroyed. At the end of the day, 50 FLORES MOLINA V. GARLAND fleeing is one of many factors the agency considered, and viewed in light of the record as a whole, one reasonable conclusion (which the agency drew) is that Molina did not suffer persecution even though he relocated after receiving threats. The cases cited by the majority do not compel otherwise.
Just as with being forced to flee, our court has also recognized that death threats can constitute persecution in a “small category of cases,” but only “where threats are repeated, specific and combined with confrontation or other mistreatment.” Duran-Rodriguez, 918 F.3d at 1028 (citation and quotation marks omitted) (determining that receiving death threats from armed men and fleeing to another town was not sufficient to compel a conclusion of past persecution); Lim v. INS, 224 F.3d 929, 936 (9th Cir. 2000) (holding that threats standing alone rarely constitute past persecution and “only when the threats are so menacing as to cause significant actual ‘suffering or harm’”) (citations omitted). Here, the record could be weighed, as the agency did, to find that Molina’s threats fall outside the small category of cases where threats constitute persecution, because the threats were not repeated, specific, or severe enough. Other than one instance, Molina’s threats were mostly indirect and detached from physical harm. 6 6 While Molina was identified along with other protestors in social media posts as a violence instigator, called despicable things like a “rabid dog,” and told that “Chipote awaits,” those posts did not contain an explicit death threat and were not sent to him directly. Molina did receive a direct threat when “Bullets to the strikers (protesters)” was FLORES MOLINA V. GARLAND 51 It is true that our court has pushed the boundary further and further away from the core of “extreme” harm and suffering. But even under our expansive caselaw, the severity and frequency of Molina’s past harm does not compel a conclusion different than the agency’s. See, e.g., Mashiri v. Ashcroft, 383 F.3d 1112, 1119–20 (9th Cir. 2004) (petitioner and his family were plagued with death threats and physical assaults for months, accompanied by slashed tires and a ransacked home); Ruano v. Ashcroft, 301 F.3d 1155, 1160–61 (9th Cir. 2002) (petitioner received dozens of death threats over the course of six years, was chased by armed men on multiple occasions, and frequently followed to his home and work); Navas v. INS, 217 F.3d 646, 658 (9th Cir. 2000) (petitioner was threatened with death after two members of his family were murdered, shot at by the same perpetrators, and his mother beaten); Smolniakova v. Gonzales, 422 F.3d 1037, 1041–42 (9th Cir. 2005) (petitioner was attacked and almost strangled to death by assailants who called her a “Jewish Bitch,” had her wrist slashed, and received multiple death threats and anti-Semitic harassment that the police refused to stop, including profanities and human feces smeared on her apartment, fires set in her mailbox, and repeated slashings of her front door). So even under our oft-wayward precedents, whether Molina’s threats and singular assault amount to persecution may be a close call, but it is not compelled by the record or our caselaw. The majority distinguishes the cases relied on by the BIA, claiming they are “not on-point” with the harm Molina suffered. But the petitioner in Lim (though he was not spray painted on his house. But—and without minimizing the gravity of the spray-painted threat—it only occurred once and was not accompanied by any physical harm. 52 FLORES MOLINA V. GARLAND physically attacked) had colleagues murdered by the dissident political group he infiltrated undercover, appeared on their death list, and suffered two years of death threats that prompted him to hire a personal bodyguard—a much longer period of harm and much more direct threats than Molina experienced. Lim, 224 F.3d at 932–35. Similarly, the petitioner in Gu (though he did not receive an explicit death threat) suffered more severe physical harm than Molina’s lost tooth and bruised lip—he was struck ten times with a rod when he was detained by the police. Gu v. Gonzales, 454 F.3d 1014, 1020 (9th Cir. 2006). Yet our court agreed that a finding of persecution was not compelled in either case. Just as with the precedents relied on by the majority, Lim and Gu are no doubt distinguishable in some ways, but they illustrate how our court has affirmed findings of no persecution despite more severe harm or threats than Molina encountered, just as the BIA did here. Again, none of the cases the majority cites compel a finding of persecution, and Lim and Gu are more than enough to support the BIA’s conclusion.
Finally, the majority argues that even if none of Molina’s past incidents rise to the level of persecution, a finding of persecution should be compelled given the “cumulative effect” and “escalating fashion” of his harms. Overturning an agency decision based on “cumulative effect” reasoning is always particularly undeferential, because whether or not disparate and independently insufficient harms cobbled together somehow suffice to meet an already ambiguous standard is really nothing more than the application of a “we know it when we see it” standard—reminiscent of Justice Stewart’s infamous search for the bounds of obscenity. See Jacobellis v. Ohio, 378 U.S. 184, 197 (1964) (Stewart, J., FLORES MOLINA V. GARLAND 53 concurring). The only circumstance in which I could imagine a court remanding an immigration case on “cumulative effect” without abandoning its deferential role would be if the agency obviously and completely failed to consider cumulative effects altogether. But here, the agency explicitly recounted and “cumulatively considered” Molina’s past harms. And while the escalating nature of his harms could support a finding of persecution, I do not see how it compels a finding of persecution—and the majority cites no case to show otherwise. The most factually similar precedent to this case is Hoxha v. Ashcroft, which was cited by the BIA in support of its determination that Molina’s past harm, even cumulatively considered, did not constitute past persecution. 319 F.3d 1179 (9th Cir. 2003). Hoxha, an ethnic Albanian from Kosovo, received multiple threats since his early childhood “that he would be harmed or killed if he chose to stay [in Kosovo],” and he was beaten on one occasion when a group of Serbs overheard he and a friend speaking Albanian. Hoxha, 319 F.3d at 1180–81. Hoxha suffered two broken ribs and extensive facial bruises from the beating. Id. at 1181. This court acknowledged that “[a]lthough Hoxha’s experiences are disturbing and regrettable, they do not evince actions so severe as to compel a finding of past persecution,” and concluded that substantial evidence supported the BIA’s finding of no past persecution. Id. at 1182. While there are some immaterial factual differences between Hoxha and this case (as no two immigration cases are the same), it is instructive here that evidence of multiple 54 FLORES MOLINA V. GARLAND threats, together with a severe beating, did not compel a conclusion that past persecution occurred in Hoxha. 7 The majority’s contention that the agency did not conduct a cumulative analysis is, at bottom, a disagreement with the result of the agency’s cumulative consideration of Molina’s past harms. Could the agency have concluded that Molina’s past harm cumulatively amounted to persecution? Sure. And the majority does an excellent job of outlining how our precedent could justify such a conclusion. But neither the record, nor even our precedent, compels a finding of past persecution. The majority places a heavy emphasis on the escalating nature of Molina’s harassment. But the reality, which after Dai we must account for, is that the agency presumably placed less weight on that consideration, and in reviewing the agency’s decision we must consider the range of permissible weight-allocations to see if any reasonable adjudicator could find as the agency did. As the majority recognizes, determining whether the facts compel a conclusion of past persecution is ultimately “a fact-bound endeavor that is not reducible to a set formula.” Because 7 One difference between Hoxha and the present case is that in Hoxha an active summons had been issued for the petitioner to report to the Serbian government and the country conditions evidence indicated “grisly documentation of numerous atrocities committed against ethnic Albanians” like Hoxha, that were not improving. Hoxha, 319 F.3d at 1181–84. Those facts led the court to conclude that Hoxha had a wellfounded fear of future persecution. See id. Here, no summons has been issued for Molina and the record is devoid of any other evidence indicating that the government or government-aligned groups have an active, ongoing interest in harming him. In the present case, the country conditions evidence before the agency indicated that conditions for political protestors in Nicaragua were improving. FLORES MOLINA V. GARLAND 55 here the formula used by the agency in weighing the evidence finds support in the record, I must defer to it.
Case Mimicking the majority, I could hop from buoy to buoy plucking different cases that support the agency’s decision, given that there are many decisions that illustrate neither death threats nor a single instance of physical harm, nor even a combination of the two, compel a finding of persecution. 8 Indeed, the instances that our court has recognized as rising to the extreme level of past persecution generally far surpass 8 See, e.g., Fuyong Cui v. Barr, 806 Fed. App’x 588, 590 (9th Cir. 2020) (petitioner failed to demonstrate past persecution even though he was arrested while participating in a protest, detained, kicked, punched in his face causing a tooth to fall out, and, after a subsequent protest, was hit several times with a baton and shocked with an electric baton); Saenz Martinez v. Barr, 818 Fed. App’x 767, 767–68 (9th Cir. 2020) (single beating at the hands of Sandinista supporters, which did not require medical treatment, and five or six unfulfilled threats did not rise to the level of persecution); Wakkary v. Holder, 558 F.3d 1049, 1059–60 (9th Cir. 2009) (petitioner’s past experiences, including two beatings, even considered cumulatively, did not compel a finding of past persecution); Gu, 454 F.3d at 1021–22 (a three-day detention, two hour interrogation, and beating with a rod did not compel a conclusion of past persecution); Hoxha, 319 F.3d at 1182 (harassment, threats, and “one incident of physical violence” did not compel a finding of past persecution); Prasad, 47 F.3d at 339–40 (arrest, interrogation, beating, and other forms of harassment including rocks thrown at his house and attempts to steal his property were not enough to compel a finding of past persecution); see also Samad v. Whitaker, 759 Fed. App’x 634, 636 (9th Cir. 2019) (threats and beating did not rise to the level of persecution); Argieta-Chavarria v. Barr, 780 Fed. App’x 519, 520 (9th Cir. 2019) (single beating and subsequent harassment and threats did not rise to the level of persecution); Dong v. Barr, 830 Fed. App’x 239, 239–40 (9th Cir. 2020) (arrest, interrogation, beating, and 48-hour detention did not rise to the level of persecution). 56 FLORES MOLINA V. GARLAND what Molina experienced in Nicaragua. 9 But as already explained, that is not the proper application of substantial evidence review. This case is a snapshot of how difficult it is to properly defer under our court’s immigration precedent because we have strayed so far from our limited role—gaining confidence, even expertise, at second-guessing the agency and reweighing the evidence—which is what the majority reflexively does here. In short, the majority’s three bases in support of its decision are simply three bases that could support a finding of past persecution under a different weighing of the evidence and emphasis on caselaw. But none of the bases for the majority’s decision compels that conclusion in the face of the agency’s authoritative decision otherwise. When analogous precedent goes both ways on an issue (as it frequently does in our circuit’s immigration caselaw, and does here on the scope of harms that constitute persecution), deference should dictate our decision and we 9 See Parada v. Sessions, 902 F.3d 901, 909–10 (9th Cir. 2018) (petitioner’s brother was assassinated, his neighbor murdered, and he was captured and beaten to the point of unconsciousness, repeatedly subjected to forced home invasions, and specific death threats toward his family—which collectively rose to the level of persecution); Bondarenko v. Holder, 733 F.3d 899, 908–09 (9th Cir. 2013) (three detentions and one severe beating constituted past persecution); Guo v. Ashcroft, 361 F.3d 1194, 1197–98 (9th Cir. 2004) (multiple arrests, detentions (including one for fifteen days), beatings, and inability to find work after being fired rose to the level of persecution); Guo, 897 F.3d at 1215 (beating which left petitioner unable to stand on his own and required medical attention, coupled with being unable to practice his faith constituted persecution). Accordingly, while Molina’s “experiences are disturbing and regrettable, they do not evince actions so severe as to compel a finding of past persecution.” Hoxha, 319 F.3d at 1182. FLORES MOLINA V. GARLAND 57 should rely on precedent that supports the agency’s decision. Just as Justice Scalia warned with respect to legislative history, we should avoid the temptation to just “look over the heads of the crowd and pick out your friends.” ANTONIN SCALIA, A MATTER OF INTERPRETATION 36 (1997) (quoting Judge Leventhal). Unless we are guided by some North Star, our precedents will often support whatever conclusion we want. That guidance—the tie-breaker between conflicting precedents—is deference to the agency. The majority cannot point to a single precedent that would require any reasonable adjudicator to find that Molina suffered persecution. Given the short duration of his harm, the singular (and relatively minor) physical encounter, vague threats, and evidence before the agency of improving country conditions—a reasonable adjudicator could have weighed the record as a whole to find that Molina suffered harassment, but not persecution, which we reserve for “extreme” suffering or harm. See Donchev v. Mukasey, 553 F.3d 1206, 1213 (9th Cir. 2009). “The possibility of drawing two inconsistent conclusions from the evidence does not prevent an administrative agency’s finding from being supported by substantial evidence.” Leon-Hernandez, 926 F.2d at 904 (citation omitted). The agency’s conclusion may not be the result I would have reached or prefer, but again, that’s not the question before us. Applying the very deferential standard of review we should be anchored to, the record does not compel the conclusion that various indirect threats, combined with a single physical attack resulting in minor injuries, constitutes past persecution. See Hoxha, 319 F.3d at 1181–82. 58 FLORES MOLINA V. GARLAND
of Future Persecution is Well-Founded. Because the record as a whole does not compel a finding of past persecution, Molina is not entitled to the presumption of future persecution that the majority awards him. Davila v. Barr, 968 F.3d 1136, 1141–42 (9th Cir. 2020). That means Molina was required to demonstrate to the agency a well-founded fear of future persecution. As already discussed, what constitutes persecution or a well-founded fear of it is an inherently ambiguous concept—underscoring the importance of deferring to the agency’s determination on those issues. The majority claims that the BIA “selectively” cited portions of the record and “ignored” other evidence of the country conditions in Nicaragua that would have supported Molina’s fear of future persecution. The majority’s position is a classic demonstration of what I’ve outlined above— looking for ways to reverse the agency’s decision instead of looking for ways to uphold it. Several reports on the conditions in Nicaragua were offered to the agency, most from 2018, and some more recent reports from 2019. The agency emphasized the more recent reports that indicated conditions in Nicaragua were improving—political prisoners were being released, and the government had announced its intention to release “all remaining political prisoners.” Whether correct or not, the agency reasonably concluded based on the evidence in front of it at the time that the political tide was turning in Nicaragua, and given that “upwards of a million people” participated in the protests but only a small fraction were pursued by the government, Molina’s fear of future persecution was too speculative to be well-founded. FLORES MOLINA V. GARLAND 59 The majority claims that because the earlier reports, which detailed the human rights abuses in Nicaragua during 2018, were not explicitly mentioned in the agency’s decision, they were ignored—justifying reversal. But it is the majority that ignores parts of the BIA’s decision in its quest to overturn it. The agency’s actual analysis expressly said it reviewed the entire record and explicitly acknowledged that “human rights abuses occur in Nicaragua.” It gleaned this fact from the parts of the record the majority says the agency ignored. The agency didn’t ignore any part of the record; it simply emphasized and gave more weight to the more recent accounts that showed conditions were improving, precisely what the agency is permitted to do. Additionally, much of the country conditions evidence that the majority claims was not considered by the agency was largely focused on the treatment of detainees in prison—not political protestors such as Molina. The majority once again misconstrues the agency’s obligations. It is not obligated to spell out every piece of evidence it relies on or rejects, nor is it required to explicitly state how much weight it gives various pieces of the record or “incant ‘magic words’” in the exercise of its discretion. Zamorano, 2 F.4th at 1222 (quoting Dai, 141 S. Ct. at 1679). III. CONCLUSION Ultimately, my view of Molina’s past harms is not far from that of my colleagues—as I noted above, the facts present a close call, and I am sympathetic to the majority’s view that Molina may have suffered past persecution. Where we diverge is our approach to the agency’s decision and the record. The majority admittedly travels a welltrodden path in its approach: looking for a basis to overturn the agency instead of scouring the record as a whole looking 60 FLORES MOLINA V. GARLAND for a way to uphold the agency if even a single reasonable factfinder could agree with its ultimate conclusion. Our court’s edifice of immigration caselaw has obfuscated the correct standard of review, making the proper approach harder to see and even harder to execute. These small differences of opinion, as illustrated in this case between my position and that of my colleagues in the majority, have been multiplied over time in many decisions, leading to the lopsided edifice that is currently improperly driving much of our court’s immigration caselaw. Because the record does not compel the conclusion that (1) the past harassment suffered by Molina rises to the level of past persecution, or that (2) such harassment—together with the most recent country conditions evidence that was before the agency—demonstrates a well-founded fear of future persecution, Molina’s petition for review of his asylum claim should be denied. Likewise, the record does not compel a contrary conclusion with respect to Molina’s remaining applications for withholding of removal, humanitarian asylum, or protection under CAT, and his petition with respect to those claims should also be denied. And finally, the BIA did not abuse its discretion in denying Molina’s motion to reopen. I would therefore deny Molina’s petitions for review.