Court Opinion

ID: 9388489
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-04-20 18:00:44.710135+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:18:20.637885
License: Public Domain

NOT FOR PUBLICATION                        FILED
                  UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS                        APR 20 2023
                                                                    MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
                                                                     U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
                            FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

Mariano Santiago Grande,                        No. 22-761

              Petitioner,                       Agency No.     A200-823-656

  v.
                                                MEMORANDUM*
Merrick B. Garland, U.S. Attorney
General,

              Respondent.

                   On Petition for Review of an Order of the
                       Board of Immigration Appeals

                            Submitted April 18, 2023**
                             San Francisco, California

Before: VANDYKE and SANCHEZ, Circuit Judges, and VRATIL, *** District
Judge.

       Mariano Santiago Grande (“Santiago Grande”), a native and citizen of

Mexico, petitions for review of the Board of Immigration Appeals’ (“BIA”)

denial of his motion to reopen his removal proceedings. He moved for

       *
             This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not
precedent except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3.
      **
             The panel unanimously concludes this case is suitable for decision
without oral argument. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(a)(2).
      ***
             The Honorable Kathryn H. Vratil, Senior United States District
Judge for the District of Kansas, sitting by designation.
reopening to apply for cancellation of removal, asylum, and withholding of

removal. We have jurisdiction under 8 U.S.C. § 1252, and we deny the petition.

      1.     Reviewing the BIA’s denial of the motion to reopen for abuse of

discretion, see Jimenez-Sandoval v. Garland, 22 F.4th 866, 868 (9th Cir. 2022),

we may affirm the BIA on any ground set forth in the decision under review,

see Recinos De Leon v. Gonzales, 400 F.3d 1185, 1189 (9th Cir. 2005).

      The BIA denied Santiago Grande’s motion to reopen to apply for

cancellation of removal after determining that he failed to establish prima facie

eligibility for relief. Prima face eligibility for cancellation of removal is

established “when the evidence reveals a reasonable likelihood that the statutory

requirements for relief have been satisfied.” Tadevosyan v. Holder, 743 F.3d

1250, 1255 (9th Cir. 2014) (quotation marks and citation omitted). The BIA

determined that Santiago Grande failed to establish that his removal would

result in exceptional and extremely unusual hardship to his four qualifying

relatives – his lawful permanent resident wife, their U.S. citizen child, and his

two U.S. citizen stepchildren.1 8 U.S.C. § 1229b(b)(1)(D). The BIA concluded

instead that Santiago Grande did not show hardship beyond the ordinary

hardship expected when a close family member is removed. The BIA did not

abuse its discretion in so concluding. See Garcia v. Holder, 621 F.3d 906, 912–

1
  Santiago Grande emphasized his stepdaughter’s mental health conditions and
the exceptional hardship he claims his removal would cause her, but as the BIA
noted, he did not submit any medical documentation or diagnosis in support of
this claim.

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13 (9th Cir. 2010).

      2.     The BIA also denied Santiago Grande’s motion to reopen to apply

for asylum and withholding of removal based on his membership in the

proposed particular social group of “deportees from the United States during the

Covid-19 Pandemic.” The BIA reasoned that Santiago Grande failed to submit

a new asylum application as required under 8 C.F.R. § 1003.2(c)(1). With

respect to this ground for denial, we find no abuse of discretion.

      Further, the BIA was well within its discretion to conclude that Santiago

Grande had not articulated a cognizable particular social group because a

proposed group of individuals deported during the Covid-19 pandemic is too

broad and amorphous to satisfy the particularity requirement. We have

previously rejected a similar proposed group of those “returning Mexicans from

the United States” as too broad to constitute a particular social group. Delgado-

Ortiz v. Holder, 600 F.3d 1148, 1151–52 (9th Cir. 2010) (internal quotation

marks omitted). It was not “arbitrary, irrational, or contrary to law” for the BIA

to conclude the same here. Jimenez-Sandoval, 22 F.4th at 868.2

      3.     The motion for a stay of removal is denied as moot. The

temporary stay of removal remains in effect until issuance of the mandate.

      PETITION DENIED.

2
 In light of our resolution of these claims, we need not reach the parties’
arguments concerning the one-year bar to asylum. See Simeonov v. Ashcroft,
371 F.3d 532, 538 (9th Cir. 2004).

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