Jose Hernandez Jasso v. Loretta E. Lynch

MEMORANDUM

Rosendo Blanco-Bautista, a native and citizen of Mexico, petitions for review of the immigration judge’s (“IJ”) determination under 8 C.F.R. § 1208.31 (a) that he did not have a reasonable fear of persecution or torture and thus is not entitled to relief from his reinstated removal order. We have jurisdiction under 8 U.S.C. § 1252 . We review for substantial evidence the agency’s factual findings, Andrade-Garcia v. Lynch, 828 F.3d 829, 833-34 (9th Cir. 2016), and we deny the petition for review.

Substantial evidence supports the IJ’s conclusion that Blanco-Bautista failed to establish a reasonable possibility of persecution on account of a protected ground, see 8 C.F.R. § 1208.31 (c), because the evidence demonstrates the cartel targeted Blanco-Bautista in furtherance of its criminal enterprise, which does not support a finding for persecution on account of a protected ground, see Parussimova v. Mukasey, 555 F.3d 734, 740 (9th Cir. 2009) (the REAL ID Act “requires that a protected ground represent ‘one central reason’ for an asylum applicant’s persecution”); Zetino v. Holder, 622 F.3d 1007, 1016 (9th Cir. 2010) (“An alien’s desire to be free from harassment by…