Court Opinion

ID: 9496997
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 16:40:46.467613+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:57:56.112610
License: Public Domain

SUTTON, Circuit Judge,
concurring in the judgment.
CONCURRENCE
I agree with the majority that the prospect of female genital mutilation (FGM) may indeed give rise to a “well-founded fear” of persecution, and I agree with the majority that the Immigration Judge’s efforts to resolve the claims of the daughter (Amare) and the mother (Abay) raise as many questions as they answer. On this record, I thus agree that the Immigration Judge’s decision cannot be affirmed.
I concur in the judgment rather than in the opinion because I fear that the majority’s opinion accepts two propositions in this area that current law does not support: (1) that women or girls may never be deported to a country where the incidence of FGM within the female population as a whole is high, regardless of the risk that a particular applicant will be subjected to FGM, and (2) that the parents of such children may not be deported either. As I read the relevant statutes, regulations and precedents, the law in this developing area does not support either generalization. In view of the stale nature of the evidence in this case as well as the fact that the administrative agency has not expressly given us its view on either point, I would prefer to ask the Immigration Judge to look at these issues in the first instance.
I.
A.
In rejecting Amare’s claim for asylum based on her fear of being subjected to FGM, the Immigration Judge relied predominantly on the fact that Amare’s sisters — who still live in Ethiopia' — have not been forced to undergo FGM. From this fact, the Immigration Judge reasoned that the threat to Amare could not be very serious either. That an asylum applicant fails to show “a reasonable possibility [that] ... she would be singled out individually for persecution,” however, does not end the inquiry. 8 C.F.R. § 208.13(b)(2)(iii). An asylum applicant may still qualify as a refugee if she can show “that there is a pattern or practice ... of persecution of a group of persons similarly situated” and that she is included within that group. Id. § 208.13(b)(2)(iii)(C); see Ramsameachire v. Ashcroft, 357 F.3d 169, 183 (2d Cir.2004).
Correctly invoking this second ground for relief, Amare points to statistics collected by the State Department showing that 90% of women and girls in Ethiopia *644have undergone FGM, then argues that these statistics necessarily establish a “pattern or practice of persecution.” Even if that is true, however, Amare still must show that she is included within a group at risk of being subjected involuntarily to FGM. 8 C.F.R. § 208.13(b)(2)(iii)(C). FGM practices vary by ethnic group, religion and geographic region, as well as by the age and marital status of the woman or girl. As a State Department report on FGM practices in Ethiopia acknowledges, some “population groups” within the country “do not practice FGM.” JA 187. As the federal statute that criminalizes FGM in this country acknowledges in regulating the practice only with respect to girls under eighteen years of age, the risks associated with FGM differ between girls and women. See 18 U.S.C. § 116; see also Nwaokolo v. INS, 314 F.3d 303, 309 (7th Cir.2002) (describing threat of FGM to four-year old girl as more significant than risk to 17-year old girl). And as another recent State Department report acknowledges, Maj. Op. at 6 n. 1, the types of FGM practiced in Ethiopia are neither uniform in nature nor uniformly debilitating to a woman’s physical and psychological health. Significant as the 90% may be, in other words, it does not establish that all women and girls — no matter their age, ethnic group, marital status, religion or geographic residence — face the same FGM risks or in some instances face any material risk at all. See Matter of Oluloro, No. A72 147 491, Slip Op. at 4 (Immigr.Ct. Mai\ 23, 1994) (noting that in Nigeria, where 50% of the total female population has undergone FGM, “the likelihood of forced FGM being visited on anyone outside [a specific] ethnic group or area is minimal to nonexistent”).
The Immigration Judge did not consider any of these points, and the current record is either conspicuously silent on each point or is not helpful to Amare’s application. In her case, for instance, it appears that she is of Amharic ethnicity and a Christian, two groups that practice FGM in Ethiopia. But the Amharas, according to the State Department reports, practice the least severe form of FGM — Type I — and Amare’s age (17) may disqualify her even from that risk. In Ethiopia, it turns out, FGM is most frequently performed within days of birth or between the age of seven and puberty. See U.S. Dep’t of State, Office of the Senior Coordinator for Int’l Women’s Issues, Ethiopia: Report on Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) or Female Genital Cutting (FGC) (June 1, 2001), at http://ummj.state.gov/glwi/rls /rep/crfgm/100098.htm. On this record, I submit, it makes sense to obtain more information and more current information about these issues before announcing an opinion that grants relief not just to Amare but potentially to any girl or woman from Ethiopia.
B.
The current paucity of evidence regarding Amare’s claim not only fails to make clear exactly what kind of risk she faces in returning to Ethiopia as a 17-year old girl, but it also fails to bring her within the orbit of any of the cases that have granted asylum in the context of an FGM claim. In the two instances in which a court of appeals granted relief on an FGM-based asylum claim, the evidence was far more concrete than it is here and the risk of FGM was far more imminent than it is here. In one case, the applicant offered evidence that she was a member of a particular tribe in Ghana that practices FGM as punishment for premarital sex; that she had engaged in premarital sex; that her tribe would assuredly learn this fact; and that her tribe would punish her as a result. See Abankwah v. INS, 185 F.3d 18 (2d Cir.1999). In the other case, the court *645relied on still more particularized evidence: the applicant’s family had already paid the traditional “bride price,” which created a binding marriage contract that permitted the man to force his bride to undergo FGM. See Moshud v. Blackman, 68 Fed.Appx. 328, 329 (3d Cir.2003). Likewise, the administrative decision that established FGM as a legitimate basis of persecution involved an imminent threat of forced FGM by the asylum applicant’s aunt and husband stemming from an arranged marriage. See In re Kasinga, 211. & N. Dec. 357 (BIA 1996).
II.
The immigration statutes and case law also fail to support Abay’s — the mother’s— derivative claim of asylum, at least on the current record. “A spouse or child ... of an alien who is granted asylum,” the applicable statute says, “may, if not otherwise eligible for asylum ..., be granted the same status.” 8 U.S.C. § 1158(b)(3)(A). By its terms, the statute does not include parents as individuals who may obtain a derivative grant of asylum. And to the extent Abay, like the applicant in the Olu-loro case, supra, see Maj. Op. at 641, seeks a suspension of deportation based on “extreme hardship” to her child, see 8 U.S.C. § 1254(a)(2) (1995), that provision was repealed. See Omnibus Consolidated Appropriations Act of 1997, Pub.L. No. 104-208, § 308(b)(7), 110 Stat. 3009 (1996). The replacement provision does not encompass Abay’s claim. See 8 U.S.C. § 1229b (allowing “cancellation of removal” for permanent resident aliens who, among other requirements, “establish[] that removal would result in exceptional and extremely unusual hardship to the alien’s ... child, who is a citizen of the United States or [an alien permanent resident]”). Nor does the regulatory authority that permits “humanitarian” grants of asylum add traction to Abay’s derivative claim. It is reserved for individuals who have established past persecution and would face “other serious harm” if deported, see 8 C.F.R. § 208.13(b)(l)(iii), a showing that Abay has not yet made.
Circuit court precedent does not advance this claim either, particularly in the absence of testimony that the child effectively would be deported alongside the parent. See, e.g., Ciorba v. Ashcroft, 323 F.3d 539, 545 (7th Cir.2003) (rejecting asylum claim to the extent it relied on mistreatment of family members rather than of the applicant); Oforji v. Ashcroft, 354 F.3d 609, 618 (7th Cir.2003) (rejecting mother’s claim for avoiding deportation based on the threat of FGM to her daughters as lacking in statutory or regulatory authority); Osigwe v. Ashcroft, 77 Fed.Appx. 235, 236 (5th Cir.2003) (noting that the parents of a girl who would be forced to undergo FGM if returned to Nigeria “are not eligible for asylum under the general asylum provisions based solely on their daughter’s risk of being subject to FGM”); Tamas-Mercea v. Reno, 222 F.3d 417, 424 (7th Cir.2000). The Seventh Circuit, it is true, once endorsed a “constructive deportation” theory, which covered parents who established that their children (who otherwise had a legal right to remain in the country) would in effect be deported along with their parents and face “extreme hardship.” See Salameda v. INS, 70 F.3d 447, 451 (7th Cir.1995). But, again, this theory rested on the now-repealed immigration statute mentioned above. To the extent recent cases suggest that the theory has continuing currency, they do so in the context of concrete indications that the child would be forced to accompany the deported parent. See Obazee v. Ashcroft, 79 Fed.Appx. 914, 916 (7th Cir.2003) (acknowledging the “constructive deportation” theory but refusing to grant relief because the petitioner did not point to any *646evidence that her daughter would necessarily have to leave the United States); Nwaokolo, 314 F.3d at 310 (granting reopening to determine whether a mother could obtain relief under the Convention Against Torture based on the fear that her four-year old daughter would face involuntary FGM if she were deported).
No more helpful to this claim are the administrative decisions of the agency. Matter of C-Y-Z, 211. & N. Dec. 915 (BIA 1997), involved the asylum claim of a man whose wife was at risk of being forced to undergo sterilization. In considering whether the husband qualified as a “refugee” under 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(42), the parties agreed that “the forced sterilization of one spouse ... is an act of persecution against the other spouse.” Id. at 919. And while Matter of Adeniji, No. A41 542 131, Slip Op. at 10 (Immigr.Ct. Mar. 10, 1998), extended the C-Y-Z logic to the FGM context, it did so with respect to five- and six-year old children.
Also missing from the record is any evidence that Abay will be “faced with exposing her child to the [ ] risk of being subjected to” FGM unless she is granted asylum. Maj. Op. at 642. The record contains nothing but silence on whether Amare would follow her mother to Ethiopia if she were deported. As a 17-year old girl who has been in this country for almost 11 years, Amare may well have other options. More critically, this evidentiary void ought to be filled before relief is granted.
III.
Even though the relevant statutes and case law currently do not support Amare’s claim and do not support granting asylum to Abay on a derivative basis, I agree with the decision to remand the case. Each claim is of recent vintage, the record is conspicuously meager with respect to each claim, and the Immigration Judge ought to be given a chance to address each claim in the context of a fresh, recently-supplemented record and after consideration of the agency’s “considerable experience and expertise” on these issues. Azanor v. Ashcroft, 364 F.3d 1013, 1021 (9th Cir.2004) (remanding case for consideration of an FGM-based derivative torture claim and treating the claim as a question of “first impression”).