Rui Yang v. Gonzales

*683 MEMORANDUM **

Rui Yang, a native and citizen of China, petitions for review of the Board of Immigration Appeals’ denial of his application for asylum and withholding of removal. 1 We have jurisdiction pursuant to 8 U.S.C. § 1252 , and we deny the petition.

The Immigration Judge (“IJ”) found Yang failed to establish either past persecution or a well-founded fear of persecution on account of a protected ground (political opinion). See 8 U.S.C. § 1158 (a) (granting Attorney General discretion to grant asylum status to alien refugees); 8 U.S.C. § 1101 (a)(42)(A) (defining “refugee” as an alien who is unable or unwilling to return to his or her country of origin “because of persecution or a well-founded fear of persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion”).

The Board of Immigration Appeals (“BIA”) adopted and affirmed the IJ’s decision and offered its own brief reasoning. We review the decisions of the IJ and the BIA for substantial evidence and will reverse only if the record compels a contrary conclusion. Prasad v. INS, 47 F.3d 336, 340 (9th Cir.1995).

“[Pjersecution is an extreme concept that does not…