Opinion
20-70581
12-15-2021
BYRON IXCATCOY LOPEZ, Petitioner, v. MERRICK B. GARLAND, Attorney General, Respondent.
NOT FOR PUBLICATION
Submitted December 8, 2021 San Francisco, California
This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3.
On Petition for Review of an Order of the Board of Immigration Appeals Agency No. A200-822-735
Before: WARDLAW, BRESS, and BUMATAY, Circuit Judges.
The panel unanimously concludes this case is suitable for decision without oral argument. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(a)(2).
Byron Lopez, a citizen of Guatemala, petitions for review of a decision by the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) dismissing his appeal of an Immigration Judge's (IJ) order denying his applications for withholding of removal and protection under the Convention Against Torture (CAT).
We have jurisdiction to review Lopez's petition under 8 U.S.C. § 1252. We review questions of law, and mixed questions of law and fact, de novo. Torres v. Barr, 976 F.3d 918, 923 (9th Cir. 2020). We review factual findings for "substantial evidence." Mairena v. Barr, 917 F.3d 1119, 1123 (9th Cir. 2019). Under that standard, we must find the BIA's findings sufficient unless, after reviewing the record as a whole, "any reasonable adjudicator" would have been "compelled" to reach a different conclusion. 8 U.S.C. § 1252(b)(4)(B); Garland v. Ming Dai, 141 S.Ct. 1669, 1677 (2021); Mairena, 917 F.3d at 1123.
We dismiss Lopez's petition because he has not raised any argument that we have jurisdiction to consider. In his brief, he makes only one argument: that he is entitled to withholding of removal because he was persecuted on account of his Quiche ethnicity. However, Lopez did not "meaningfully raise[]" that argument in front of the BIA, and when a petitioner does not present an issue to the BIA, we may not consider it. See, e.g., Sola v. Holder, 720 F.3d 1134, 1135 (9th Cir. 2013) ("A petitioner's failure to raise an issue before the BIA generally constitutes a failure to exhaust, thus depriving this court of jurisdiction to consider the issue.").
The BIA denied relief on various other grounds, but Lopez does not raise any apparent challenge to them in his briefing. To the extent he purports to do so, his briefing does not sufficiently present the issues for our review. See Sekiya v. Gates, 508 F.3d 1198, 1200 (9th Cir. 2007) ("Bare assertions and lists of facts unaccompanied by analysis and completely devoid of caselaw fall far short of the requirement that counsel present 'appellant's contentions and the reasons for them.'" (quoting Fed. R. App. P. 28(a)(8)(A)); Martinez-Serrano v. INS, 94 F.3d 1256, 1259 (9th Cir. 1996) ("[A]n issue referred to in the appellant's statement of the case but not discussed in the body of the opening brief is deemed waived.").
PETITION DISMISSED.