Court Opinion

ID: 9642521
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 18:01:21.001892+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T11:52:47.925785
License: Public Domain

Case: 22-60472        Document: 00516867114             Page: 1      Date Filed: 08/22/2023

             United States Court of Appeals
                  for the Fifth Circuit                                        United States Court of Appeals
                                     ____________                                       Fifth Circuit

                                                                                      FILED
                                      No. 22-60472                              August 22, 2023
                                    Summary Calendar                             Lyle W. Cayce
                                    ____________                                      Clerk

   Saira Yanira Cunza-Pashaca; Edgardo Josue Valencia-
   Cunza,

                                                                               Petitioners,

                                            versus

   Merrick Garland, U.S. Attorney General,

                                                                               Respondent.
                     ______________________________

                        Petition for Review of an Order of the
                            Board of Immigration Appeals
                             Agency Nos. A215 929 763,
                                     A215 929 764
                     ______________________________

   Before Wiener, Elrod, and Engelhardt, Circuit Judges.
   Per Curiam: *
         Petitioner Saira Yanira Cunza-Pashaca, a native and citizen of El
   Salvador, entered the United States illegally with her son in 2018. She
   petitions for review of the Board of Immigration Appeals’ (“BIA”) decision
   that dismissed her appeal and affirmed the immigration judge’s (“IJ”) denial

         _____________________
         *
             This opinion is not designated for publication. See 5th Cir. R. 47.5.
Case: 22-60472        Document: 00516867114             Page: 2      Date Filed: 08/22/2023

                                         No. 22-60472

   of her claims for asylum, withholding of removal, and protection under the
   Convention Against Torture (“CAT”). 1
               I.   Factual and Procedural Background
           During her asylum hearing before the IJ, Cunza-Pashaca proposed two
   particular social groups (“PSGs”): (1) El Salvadoran women and (2) El
   Salvadoran women who are seen as property by their spouse. The IJ allowed
   Cunza-Pashaca to go forward with the first PSG but not the second because
   she had failed to file a brief identifying her PSGs 30-days prior to the hearing
   as ordered by the IJ. The IJ also stated that there was no indication in Cunza-
   Pashaca’s asylum application that she was seeking relief based on the PSG of
   El Salvadoran women who are seen as property by their spouse. The IJ then
   turned to the merits of Cunza-Pashaca’s asylum claim and concluded that
   she had failed to establish the requisite nexus between the harm she suffered
   in El Salvador and her PSG of El Salvadoran women.
           Prior to presenting testimony, Cunza-Pashaca moved to have her
   son’s case severed from hers. Her attorney explained that the state of
   Louisiana had issued the ruling needed for Cunza-Pashaca’s son to obtain
   special juvenile status on January 18, 2019. The IJ questioned the timeliness
   of the request given that special status had been granted months prior to the
   scheduled hearing, yet no motion to sever had been made until the day of the
   hearing. The DHS opposed the motion. The IJ denied the motion,
   determining that it was “simply a delaying tactic” given that there was
   “ample opportunity” to timely file a motion. The IJ questioned “[w]hy this
   matter couldn’t have been brought forward within a timely fashion, certainly

           _____________________
           1
             Because Cunza-Pashaca is the lead petitioner and her son’s claims for
   immigration relief are derivative of her claim, we will refer only to Cunza-Pashaca unless
   otherwise specified.

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   within the 15 days envisioned by the practice manual, much less the 60-day
   continuance deadline” and ultimately found that there was “no good cause”
   to allow the untimely motion to sever.
          Cunza-Pashaca appealed the IJ’s decision to the BIA and renewed her
   request to sever her son’s case from her appeal. The BIA considered only the
   PSG of El Salvadoran women as the basis for Cunza-Pashaca’s claim for relief
   from removal, concluding that Cunza-Pashaca had not challenged the IJ’s
   refusal to evaluate the second PSG of El Salvadoran women who are seen as
   property by their spouse. The BIA agreed with the IJ’s determination that no
   nexus existed between the harm Cunza-Pashaca suffered and her
   membership in a PSG. The BIA explained that Cunza-Pashaca “was [the]
   victim of private criminal activity at the hands of her husband.” The BIA
   determined that she had not met her burden of establishing eligibility for
   asylum or withholding of removal. Because the IJ’s nexus finding was
   dispositive, the BIA did not consider Cunza-Pashaca’s remaining arguments
   related to her eligibility for asylum and withholding of removal. Cunza-
   Pashaca timely appealed.
           II.   Law and Analysis
          This court reviews the BIA’s decision and considers the IJ’s decision
   only to the extent it influenced the BIA. Orellana-Monson v. Holder, 685 F.3d
   511, 517 (5th Cir. 2012). The BIA’s factual findings are reviewed for
   substantial evidence, and its legal conclusions are reviewed de novo. Id. at 517–
   18. This court will not reverse the BIA’s factual findings unless the evidence
   compels a contrary conclusion. Id. at 518.
                     A. The BIA’s Asylum and Withholding of Removal
                         Determination
          On appeal, Cunza-Pashaca contends that she is eligible for asylum and
   withholding of removal based on her membership in the PSG of “El

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   Salvadoran women seen as property by their spouse.” However, Cunza-
   Pashaca did not challenge the IJ’s refusal to consider this PSG in her appeal
   to the BIA. Therefore, the government contends that this court lacks
   jurisdiction to consider the IJ’s refusal to consider the PSG of “El Salvadoran
   women seen by property by their spouse,” citing this court’s long-held view
   that the exhaustion requirement under 8 U.S.C. § 1252(d)(1) is jurisdictional
   in nature.
          Recently, the U.S. Supreme Court granted certiorari to consider
   whether the exhaustion requirement is jurisdictional and whether a new error
   by the BIA must be raised in a motion to reconsider. Santos-Zacaria v.
   Garland, 22 F.4th 570, 573 (5th Cir. 2022), cert. granted, 143 S. Ct. 82 (2022).
   In Santos-Zacaria v. Garland, the Supreme Court overruled our circuit’s view
   that the exhaustion requirement of 8 U.S.C. § 1252(d)(1) is jurisdictional in
   nature. 143 S. Ct. 1103, 1120 (2023). The Court held that the exhaustion
   requirement is instead a claim-processing rule. Id. at 1113–14. However,
   neither the Supreme Court nor our court has decided whether § 1252(d)(1)
   is a mandatory claim-processing rule. See Carreon v. Garland, 71 F.4th 247,
   257 n.11 (5th Cir. 2023). We previously held that “[a] claim-processing rule
   requiring parties to take certain procedural steps in, or prior to, litigation,
   may be mandatory in the sense that a court must enforce the rule if timely
   raised.” Fort Bend Cnty., Texas v. Davis, 139 S. Ct. 1843, 1844 (2019) (citation
   omitted). Since the government here properly raised exhaustion, we need not
   decide whether § 1252(d)(1) requires us to do so. Id. at 1849. We agree that
   the issue is unexhausted and therefore decline to reach it.
          Cunza-Pashaca also states, but does not argue beyond stating the
   issue, that she is eligible for asylum and withholding of removal based on her
   membership in the PSG of El Salvadoran women, which was the only
   proposed social group considered by the BIA. She has therefore abandoned
   that issue. See Chambers v. Mukasey, 520 F.3d 445, 448 n.1 (5th Cir. 2008)

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   (stating that a petitioner fails to brief an issue by merely listing it without
   further argument); Soadjede v. Ashcroft, 324 F.3d 830, 833 (5th Cir. 2003)
   (stating that issues not briefed are abandoned). Because the BIA’s no-nexus
   finding is dispositive and there were no other administratively-exhausted
   protected grounds before the BIA, Cunza-Pashaca cannot show that she is
   eligible for asylum or withholding of removal. See Majd, 446 F.3d at 595.
                    B. Cunza-Pashaca’s Motion to Sever
          Cunza-Pashaca asserts that the denial of her motion to sever
   constituted an abuse of discretion. She does not dispute the fact that her
   attorney waited until the day of the hearing on the merits of her asylum
   application to make an oral motion to sever her son’s case, despite the
   requirement in Chapter 3.1(b)(i)(A) of the Immigration Court Practice
   Manual that “filings must be submitted at least fifteen (15) days in advance
   of the hearing if requesting a ruling prior to the hearing.” See
   https://tinyurl.com/yckrpuhr (Chapter 3.1(b)(i)(A)). Rather, Cunza-
   Pashaca contends that the IJ should have ignored the untimeliness of the
   motion and “focused on the merits.” Cunza-Pashaca maintains that such
   motions are routinely brought the day of the hearing in the New Orleans
   immigration court and that the IJ erred in holding that the motion was a form
   of “gamesmanship” or “a delaying tactic.” The government counters that
   this court lacks jurisdiction to consider the IJ’s denial of Cunza-Pashaca’s
   motion to sever her son’s claims from her case.
          This court reviews questions of law regarding jurisdiction de novo.
   Ramirez-Molina v. Ziglar, 436 F.3d 508, 513 (5th Cir. 2006) (citations
   omitted). Contrary to the government’s assertion, we have jurisdiction to
   review that question under the abuse-of-discretion standard. See Khan v.
   Holder, 353 F. App’x 897, 899 n.3 (5th Cir. 2009) (reviewing the denial of a
   severance for abuse of discretion); see also Witter v. INS, 113 F.3d 549, 555

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   (5th Cir. 1997) (reviewing the disposition of a motion for continuance for
   abuse of discretion). Under the abuse-of-discretion standard, an agency
   decision will be upheld “so long as it is not capricious, racially invidious,
   utterly without foundation in the evidence, or otherwise so aberrational that
   it is arbitrary rather than the result of any perceptible rational approach.”
   Galvez-Vergara v. Gonzales, 484 F.3d 798, 801 (5th Cir. 2007) (internal
   quotation marks and citation omitted). “The BIA acts arbitrarily when it
   disregards its own precedents and policies without giving a reasonable
   explanation for doing so.” Id. (internal quotation marks and citation
   omitted).
          Cunza-Pashaca has not satisfied her burden of showing that the IJ and
   the BIA acted in an arbitrary and capricious manner in denying her request
   to sever her son’s case. See Galvez-Vergara, 484 F.3d at 801. The IJ noted the
   15-day deadline prior to finding “no good cause” for Cunza-Pashaca’s
   untimely motion to sever. Again, Cunza-Pashaca does not meaningfully
   challenge the IJ’s reliance on the filing deadline set out in the Immigration
   Court Practice Manual, instead claiming that the IJ should have ignored the
   untimeliness of the motion and “focused on the merits.” Cunza-Pashaca also
   fails to address the BIA’s determination that, despite the DHS’s approval of
   her son’s petition for special immigration juvenile status, the “priority date
   [was] not current, he [did] not have an immediately available visa number,
   and it [was] not clear when a visa number [would] become available to him,”
   and that therefore there was no basis to grant Cunza-Pashaca’s renewed
   motion to sever. We conclude that Cunza-Pashaca has not shown that the
   agency acted in an arbitrary and capricious manner in denying her request to
   sever her son’s case. See Galvez-Vergara v. Gonzales, 484 F.3d 798, 801 (5th
   Cir. 2007).

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                     C. The BIA’s Denial of CAT Relief
          Cunza-Pashaca claims that the BIA erred in denying CAT relief
   because it is more likely than not that she “would be subjected to severe
   physical pain or death” at her husband’s hand if removed to El Salvador. She
   also appears to argue that, given her husband’s family connections within the
   police force, she would be harmed and left unprotected in El Salvador.
          Even though Cunza-Pashaca described physical abuse by her husband,
   the record does not compel the reversal of the BIA’s determination that such
   abuse did not rise to the level of torture, see Orellana-Monson, 685 F.3d at 518.
   “Torture is an extreme form of cruel and inhuman treatment and does not
   include lesser forms of cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment
   that do not amount to torture.” 8 C.F.R. § 1208.18(a)(2). Neither does the
   record likewise compel the reversal of the BIA’s adoption of the IJ’s findings
   with regard to government acquiescence. See Orellana-Monson, 685 F.3d at
   518. Cunza-Pashaca’s own testimony reflects that she was able to report her
   husband’s abuse to a patrol officer in El Salvador. Her “speculation that the
   police might not prevent” her husband’s abuse is insufficient to support her
   CAT claim. See Garcia v. Holder, 756 F.3d 885, 892 (5th Cir. 2014).
          III.   Conclusion
          Cunza-Pashaca’s petition for review is DENIED.

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