Qing Lin v. Loretta E. Lynch

MEMORANDUM

Quin Feng Lin&emdash;and derivatively, Shu-rong Zou&emdash;petition for review of the Board of Immigration Appeals’s (“BIA”) final order dismissing their appeal of the Immigration Judge’s (“IJ”) decision denying them asylum, withholding of removal, and relief under the Convention Against Torture (“CAT”). We have jurisdiction over these consolidated petitions under 8 U.S.C. § 1252 (a)(1). We deny the petitions for review.

1. Lin has not established that he is a member of a “particular social group” that (1) is comprised of members who share a “common, immutable characteristic,” (2) “can accurately be described in a manner sufficiently distinct that the group would be recognized, in the society in question, as a discrete class of persons,” Henriquez-Rivas v. Holder, 707 F.3d 1081, 1083, 1091 (9th Cir.2013) (en banc) (citations and internal quotation marks omitted), and (3) “is understood to exist as a recognized component of the society in question,” Matter of W-G-R-, 26 I. & N. Dec. 208, 217 (BIA 2014), cited favorably in Pirir-Boc v. Holder, 750 F.3d 1077, 1079 (9th Cir.2014). Nor does the record compel the conclusion that the Chinese government persecuted Lin because…