O R D E R
Erdenesaikhan Batchuluun, a native of Mongolia, entered the United States in 2017 on a B-2 visitor visa. After overstaying his visa, he applied for asylum, withholding of removal, and relief under the Convention Against Torture ("CAT"). In 2022, an Immigration Judge ("IJ") denied Batchuluun all relief, finding that he had failed to testify credibly or adequately corroborate his claim. Batchuluun appealed, and the Board of Immigration Appeals (the "Board") affirmed, finding that Batchuluun had
"not meaningfully challenged" the IJ's dispositive credibility determination and had therefore waived it. Batchuluun now petitions for our review. Because we agree that Batchuluun failed to administratively exhaust his challenge to the IJ's credibility finding, we affirm.
I
Batchuluun and his wife traveled from Mongolia to Seattle, Washington in September 2017 on United States B-2 visitor visas, which authorized them to stay in the country until March 16, 2018. After overstaying their visas, Batchuluun and his wife filed a Form I-589 asylum application with United States Citizenship and Immigration Services in June 2018. Batchuluun's wife was a derivative applicant on Batchuluun's application, meaning she could obtain relief only if Batchuluun's application was granted. See Miljkovic v. Ashcroft, 366 F.3d 580, 581 (7th Cir. 2004). Accordingly, we only review the circumstances upon which Batchuluun, the primary asylum seeker, bases his claim. See 8 U.S.C. § 1158(b)(3)(A); 8 C.F.R. § 1208.21.
On August 28, 2018, the Department of Homeland Security ("DHS") initiated removal proceedings and issued a notice to appear, charging Batchuluun with removability under 8 U.S.C. § 1227(a)(1)(B) for "remain[ing] in the United States for a time longer than permitted." At a hearing before an IJ on September 26, 2018, Batchuluun conceded the charge of removability but declined to designate a country of removal. On January 14, 2022, Batchuluun filed an amended Form I-589 application seeking asylum, withholding of removal, and relief under the CAT. Batchuluun testified before the IJ at a hearing on the merits of his application on January 31, 2022. He explained that he was from the capital of Mongolia, Ulaanbaatar, where he obtained his degree in business administration and worked for the
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government as an inspection specialist. In that role, Batchuluun evaluated permit applications for the use of government-owned land. He reported to Purevdavaa Davaakhuu, the governor of the district of Bayanzurkh. Batchuluun explained how Purevdavaa orchestrated a scheme of soliciting bribes from permit applicants in exchange for the issuance of under-the-table permits. Batchuluun detailed Purevdavaa's power and connections in Mongolia, including his ties to law enforcement. Batchuluun also recounted several incidents involving Purevdavaa that led him to leave the country. First, in September 2013, Batchuluun visited an elderly man with Purevdavaa and Purevdavaa's deputy to demand that the man relinquish his land to the government. When the man refused, Purevdavaa struck the man, causing him to fall and hit his head against a bed post, dying on the spot. Purevdavaa threatened to charge Batchuluun with the murder, or to kill Batchuluun, if Batchuluun told anyone or reported it to the police.
The second incident came a few months later in November 2013, after Batchuluun had decided to quit his job. While at home, two individuals forcibly took Batchuluun to a remote area where Purevdavaa was waiting. After beating him up, the men threatened to kill Batchuluun or charge him with the elderly man's murder unless he remained employed with Purevdavaa.
Third, in February 2014, Batchuluun reported Purevdavaa to the anti-corruption agency after Purevdavaa asked him to deposit donations meant for the government into Purevdavaa's personal account. While at the agency, the authorities arrested and incarcerated Batchuluun for the murder of the elderly man. Batchuluun assumed his arrest resulted from Purevdavaa's connections at the agency and was retaliation for his report. While in jail, three of Batchuluun's cellmates harassed and physically attacked him, accusing him of killing the elderly man. Batchuluun received treatment for these injuries at a hospital. After two months, Purevdavaa got Batchuluun released on the condition that he continue working for him. Batchuluun did so until he left for the Unted States in 2017, all the while continuing to receive death threats from Purevdavaa. Batchuluun could not escape earlier from Mongolia because he was afraid of Purevdavaa and was experiencing financial issues.
The IJ found that Batchuluun failed to testify credibly or adequately corroborate his claim and denied all relief. The judge described about a dozen inconsistencies within Batchuluun's testimony and declarations regarding each of the three incidents above. For example, in Batchuluun's original declaration, he stated that Purevdavaa
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"appointed" his deputy and Batchuluun to meet with the elderly man, that it was the deputy who struck the man, and that the man died of a stroke. He testified and submitted in a subsequent declaration that it was Purevdavaa who had killed the man and positioned the man's body to make it look as though he'd had a stroke. Also, while Batchuluun's original declaration stated that Purevdavaa's deputy forcibly took him from his home in November 2013, he testified later that it was two unknown men who took him. Further, Batchuluun testified that he was arrested at the anti-corruption agency while reporting Purevdavaa's illegal activities. But in his original declaration, he stated that he was "headed out for lunch break" when the police approached him and took him to jail. The judge determined that based on these inconsistences, Batchuluun was not credible. She also found Batchuluun failed to rehabilitate his credibility because he had not sufficiently corroborated his testimony with credible evidence. Last, the IJ determined that even if Batchuluun were credible, his claims would fail on the merits. Batchuluun appealed, and the Board affirmed, finding Batchuluun had "not meaningfully challenged" the credibility determination and had therefore waived it. Because the credibility finding was dispositive of Batchuluun's applications for relief and protection from removal, the Board did not address the merits. Batchuluun petitions for our review.
II
Batchuluun seeks to challenge the IJ's credibility determination, but we agree with the government that he failed to administratively exhaust this challenge, precluding our review. 8 U.S.C. § 1252(d)(1); Muñoz-Rivera v. Garland, 81 F.4th 681, 687 (7th Cir. 2023) (citing Issaq v. Holder, 617 F.3d 962, 968 (7th Cir. 2010) ("A court may review a final order of removal only if the applicant first exhausts all administrative remedies available [to petitioner] as of right . . . this includes the obligation to first present to the Board any arguments that lie within its power to address.") (quotations omitted)). To exhaust a claim, the petitioner must argue it "specifically and with enough detail to put the Board on notice that [he] is trying to challenge the immigration judge's decision based on that argument." Muñoz-Rivera, 81 F.4th at 687-88. The requirement is not a jurisdictional rule, but rather a "case-processing rule that limits arguments available" to petitioners before this court "when those arguments have not been raised properly at the agency level." Issaq, 617 F.3d at 968.
In his appeal to the Board, Batchuluun did not challenge the IJ's lengthy adverse credibility finding "specifically" or with any detail. The only language touching on
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credibility at all is the final sentence of a section concerning membership in a particular social group, which states:
Taking all of these circumstances into account, the Board of
Immigration Appeals should find that the Immigration Judge clearly erred as Respondent's testimony was sufficiently detailed and his credibility should not have been called into question due to the minor inconsistencies noted by the Immigration Judge.
Aside from being buried within a section of Batchuluun's brief wholly unrelated to the credibility finding, the language addresses none of the contradictions found by the IJ between and within Batchuluun's declarations and testimony regarding the elderly man's death, the November 2013 attack, or his February 2014 incarceration. See Muñoz- Rivera, 81 F.4th at 688 ("Because Muñoz's arguments failed to engage substantively with most of the immigration judge's factual findings regarding credibility, the Board held that she 'waived any challenge' to those findings. We agree."). Because Batchuluun failed to "engage substantively" with the credibility finding, he did not properly exhaust his remedies on this issue and has waived this argument for relief. Id. The IJ also found that he failed to rehabilitate his credibility with credible corroborating evidence. But nowhere in Batchuluun's Board appeal did he challenge that separate finding, so we extend waiver to this issue as well.
In light of the waiver, we accept the finding that Batchuluun was not credible. Because such an adverse credibility finding "doom[s] the applicant's claimed eligibility,"
we do not reach Batchuluun's separate challenge to the IJ's alternative findings on the merits. Dai v. Garland, 24 F.4th 628, 635 (7th Cir. 2022). As they have not met the lower burden for asylum, Batchuluun and his wife cannot meet the higher burdens required for withholding of removal and protection under the CAT. Alvarenga-Flores v. Sessions, 901 F.3d 922, 926 (7th Cir. 2018).
Accordingly, we DENY Batchuluun's petition for review.
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