Court Opinion

ID: 9401531
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-06-13 15:01:57.810691+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:19:53.322465
License: Public Domain

USCA11 Case: 22-13188   Document: 20-1      Date Filed: 06/13/2023    Page: 1 of 6

                                                  [DO NOT PUBLISH]
                                   In the
                United States Court of Appeals
                        For the Eleventh Circuit

                         ____________________

                                No. 22-13188
                          Non-Argument Calendar
                         ____________________

       MARIO BALTAZAR-FELIPE,
                                                               Petitioner,
       versus
       U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL,

                                                              Respondent.

                         ____________________

                   Petition for Review of a Decision of the
                        Board of Immigration Appeals
                          Agency No. A216-021-055
                          ____________________
USCA11 Case: 22-13188     Document: 20-1      Date Filed: 06/13/2023    Page: 2 of 6

       2                      Opinion of the Court                22-13188

       Before WILSON, BRASHER, and MARCUS, Circuit Judges.
       PER CURIAM:
              Mario Baltazar-Felipe seeks review of the order of the
       Board of Immigration Appeals (“BIA”) affirming the Immigration
       Judge’s (“IJ”) decision denying Baltazar-Felipe’s application for
       cancellation of removal under the Immigration and Nationality
       Act (“INA”), 8 U.S.C. § 1229b(b)(1). Baltazar-Felipe argues that
       the BIA erred in concluding that one of his sons, who turned 21
       years old after the IJ’s decision but before the BIA’s, was no longer
       a qualifying relative whose hardship was relevant to Baltazar-
       Felipe’s eligibility for cancellation of removal. After careful re-
       view, we deny the petition.
              We review only the decision of the BIA, except to the ex-
       tent the BIA expressly adopts the IJ’s decision or explicitly agrees
       with the IJ’s findings. Jeune v. U.S. Att’y Gen., 810 F.3d 792, 799
       (11th Cir. 2016). We lack jurisdiction to review any judgment re-
       garding cancellation of removal except to the extent that the peti-
       tioner raises a constitutional claim or question of law. 8 U.S.C. §
       1252(a)(2)(B)(i), (D). We review questions of law de novo. Jeune,
       810 F.3d at 799. We will defer to the BIA’s interpretation of an
       immigration statute if: (1) the statute is ambiguous; and (2) the
       interpretation is reasonable and does not contradict the clear in-
       tent of Congress. De Sandoval v. U.S. Att’y Gen., 440 F.3d 1276,
       1278–79 (11th Cir. 2006).
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       22-13188               Opinion of the Court                       3

              The BIA lacks the authority to engage in fact-finding, apart
       from taking judicial notice of facts not subject to reasonable dis-
       pute, and instead may only review factual findings made by the IJ
       to determine if those findings are clearly erroneous. 8 C.F.R.
       § 1003.1(d)(3)(i), (iv). The “application of a legal standard to un-
       disputed or established facts” is a question of law. Guerrero-
       Lasprilla v. Barr, 140 S. Ct. 1062, 1068 (2020).
              Under the INA, the Attorney General has the discretion to
       cancel the removal of noncitizens who are not lawful permanent
       residents (“LPRs”) if they establish that: (1) they have been con-
       tinuously physically present in the United States “for a continuous
       period of not less than 10 years immediately preceding the date of
       such application” for cancellation of removal; (2) they have been
       “person[s] of good moral character” while present in the United
       States; (3) they have not been convicted of certain specified crimi-
       nal offenses; and (4) their “removal would result in exceptional
       and extremely unusual hardship” to their “spouse, parent, or
       child, who is a citizen [or LPR] of the United States.” 8 U.S.C.
       § 1229b(b)(1). According to the INA, “child” is defined as an un-
       married person under 21 years of age. See id. § 1101(b)(1).
              The BIA has held that an application for cancellation of
       removal “is a continuing one,” and therefore the issues of qualify-
       ing relatives and of good moral character “should properly be
       considered as of the time an application for cancellation of re-
       moval is finally decided” by the BIA on appeal. Matter of Bautista
       Gomez, 23 I. & N. Dec. 893, 894 (BIA 2006); see also id. at 894–95
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       4                      Opinion of the Court                22-13188

       (noting that the only eligibility element that must be established
       prior to the service of a notice to appear (“NTA”) is continuous
       physical presence, which ends with service of the NTA pursuant
       to the INA’s stop-time rule found in 8 U.S.C. § 1229b(d)(1)). The
       period during which qualifying relatives are determined ends with
       the entry of a final administrative order, because any other rule
       would prevent important life events such as the birth of a qualify-
       ing child, marriage, or the serious accident or illness of a relative
       from being afforded the appropriate consideration in the adjudica-
       tion process. Id. at 893–95.
               Applying the “continuing application” doctrine of Bautista
       Gomez, the BIA has held that whether a potentially qualifying rela-
       tive is a “child” is determined on the date of the adjudication of
       the non-citizen’s application. Matter of Isidro-Zamorano, 25 I. & N.
       Dec. 829, 831 (BIA 2012). In Matter of Isidro-Zamorano, a non-
       citizen applied for cancellation of removal and argued that his son
       was a qualifying relative, but when an IJ adjudicated the claim,
       the son was over 21 and the application was denied for lack of a
       qualifying relative. Id. at 829–30. The BIA affirmed that the son
       was no longer a “child” and therefore not a qualifying relative on
       appeal. Id. at 831–33.
             Here, as an initial matter, the BIA did not engage in im-
       proper fact finding when it said that Baltazar-Felipe’s son Andres
       was 21 at the time of its decision. For starters, the question of
       when age is established in identifying qualifying relatives is a
       question of law that we have jurisdiction to review. 8 U.S.C. §
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       22-13188               Opinion of the Court                         5

       1252(a)(2)(B)(i), (D); Guerrero-Lasprilla, 140 S. Ct. at 1068. And in
       stating Andres’s age, the BIA merely applied the established fact
       of Andres’s birthdate to the date of the BIA’s decision and the
       BIA’s legal standard for when an applicant qualifies as a “child”
       under the cancellation of removal statute. Guerrero-Lasprilla, 140
       S. Ct. at 1068; see also 8 U.S.C. § 1229b(b)(1)(D); 8 C.F.R. §
       1003.1(d)(3)(i), (ii), (iv). Thus, the BIA did not err when it stated
       that Andres was 21 years old.
               Turning to the merits, we are unpersuaded by Baltazar-
       Felipe’s claim that the BIA’s interpretation of 8 U.S.C. § 1229b(b)
       is unreasonable. First, the statute is unambiguous. It provides
       that “removal [must] result in exceptional and extremely unusual
       hardship” to the petitioner’s “child,” which is defined in the INA
       as an unmarried person under 21 years of age. 8 U.S.C. §
       1229b(b)(1)(D); 8 U.S.C. § 1101(b)(1). In other words, the plain
       language of the statute indicates that the relative must be a child --
       that is, under 21 years of age and unmarried -- when the hardship
       of removal occurs, which can only be after the final adjudication
       of the application for cancellation of removal.
              But even if the statute were somehow ambiguous as to
       timing, the BIA’s interpretation that the applicant’s relative must
       be a “child” throughout the final adjudication of the application is
       a reasonable construction of the statutory language. Indeed, the
       BIA’s interpretation of the statute has construed the entire hard-
       ship-to-qualifying-relatives provision as applying to the facts as
       they evolve while the application is pending. So, under the BIA’s
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       6                      Opinion of the Court                22-13188

       reading, if new U.S. citizen or LPR children are born, their hard-
       ship can be considered, whereas if formerly qualifying relatives
       “age out” of the “child” definition, their hardship is no longer rel-
       evant to the applicant’s eligibility. In so doing, the BIA’s treat-
       ment of the hardship-to-qualifying-relatives determination as a
       “continuing” analysis -- similar to other determinations like good
       moral character -- is a permissible interpretation of the statute.
       Accordingly, the BIA properly found that Andres is no longer a
       child, and, thus, that any hardship posed to Andres by Baltazar-
       Felipe’s removal does not factor into the adjudication of Baltazar-
       Felipe’s application for cancellation of removal.
             PETITION DENIED.