Ying Hong Zhou v. Gonzales

*239 MEMORANDUM *

Ying Hong Zhou applied for asylum on the basis that because she had given birth to three children while living on the Northern Mariana Islands, she would be forcibly sterilized if required to return to China. The Immigration Judge (“IJ”) denied her asylum claim, finding she failed to demonstrate an objectively well-founded fear of future persecution, and the Board of Immigration Appeals affirmed the IJ in a streamlined opinion. Because substantial evidence supports the IJ’s determinations we deny Zhou’s petition for review.

At the removal hearing Zhou testified that she knew of several individuals in her home village, a neighbor and two family members, who were forcibly sterilized after violating China’s one-child policy. She stated that she feared the same treatment if she returned to China with her three children born in the Northern Mariana Islands. The IJ credited this testimony and found that Zhou had a subjective fear of persecution. Nonetheless, the IJ determined that Zhou had not demonstrated the fear was objectively reasonable, as the record contained no information on China’s treatment of women, like Zhou, who give birth overseas.

The record did…