Ming Dai v. Sessions

The Ninth Circuit granted a petition for review of the BIA's denial of asylum and withholding where petitioner, a citizen of China, alleged that he was beaten, arrested, jailed, and denied food, water, sleep, and medical care because he tried to stop the police from forcing his wife to have an abortion. The panel held that neither the IJ nor the BIA made a finding that petitioner's testimony was not credible. Under the panel's well-established precedent, the panel was required to treat a petitioner's testimony as credible in the absence of such a finding. The panel adopted this rule before the REAL ID Act and reaffirmed it after its passage. The panel explained that the plain text and context of the statute dictate the conclusion that the REAL ID Act's rebuttable presumption of credibility applies only on appeal to the BIA. In this case, petitioner's evidence was sufficiently persuasive and compelled the conclusion that the harm he suffered from the government due to his resistance to his wife's forced abortion rose to the level of past persecution. Furthermore, petitioner and his wife were not similarly situated, and thus the BIA erred in concluding that the wife's voluntary return to China undermined petitioner's own fear of future persecution. The panel remanded for the district court to exercise its discretion in granting petitioner asylum relief, and to grant him withholding relief. View "Ming Dai v. Sessions" on Justia Law