United States Court of Appeals For the Eighth Circuit ___________________________ No. 20-2200 ___________________________ Claudia Gonzales Quecheluno, Betsaida Greys Ramirez Gonzales, and Dulce Dana Ramirez Gonzales lllllllllllllllllllllPetitioners v. Merrick B. Garland, Attorney General of the United States lllllllllllllllllllll Respondent ____________ Petition for Review of an Order of the Board of Immigration Appeals ____________ Submitted: June 16, 2021 Filed: August 12, 2021 ____________ Before LOKEN, KELLY, and ERICKSON, Circuit Judges. ____________ KELLY, Circuit Judge. Mexican nationals Claudia Gonzalez Quechuleno and her daughters, Betsaida Greys Ramirez Gonzalez and Dulce Dana Ramirez Gonzalez, petition for review of a May 2020 order from the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) denying their motion to reopen and remand.1 Upon careful review of the record and the briefs, we grant the petition. I. Petitioners applied for admission into the United States at the San Ysidro Port of Entry on December 9, 2015, and Customs and Border Protection granted them parole soon after. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) subsequently served Petitioners with Notices to Appear, charging them with inadmissibility under 8 U.S.C. § 1182(a)(7)(A)(i)(I), and terminated their parole status. Petitioners conceded the charge of inadmissibility and applied for asylum, withholding of removal, and protection under the Convention Against Torture. On June 1, 2017, after a merits hearing, an immigration judge (IJ) denied Petitioners’ applications for relief and ordered them removed to Mexico. Later that month, Petitioners applied for U nonimmigrant status (U visa) with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS). See 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(15)(U); 8 C.F.R. § 214.14. Petitioners then timely appealed the IJ’s decision to the BIA. While the appeal was pending, Petitioners filed a motion asking the BIA to administratively close their case to await the outcome of their U visa application.2 In September 2018, the BIA dismissed Petitioners’ appeal and denied their motion to administratively close the proceedings. Citing an intervening decision by the Attorney General, see Matter of Castro-Tum, 27 I&N Dec. 271, 281, 292 (AG 1 Quechuleno’s daughters are included as derivative beneficiaries on their mother’s applications for relief. Although the case caption lists their names as “Quecheluno” and “Gonzales,” the administrative record indicates the correct spellings are “Quechuleno” and “Gonzalez.” This opinion will therefore use the latter. 2 Administrative closure is “a docket management tool . . . used to temporarily pause removal proceedings.” Matter of W-Y-U-, 27 I&N Dec. 17, 18 (BIA 2017); see also Garcia-DeLeon v. Garland, 999 F.3d 986, 989 (6th Cir. 2021) (“For at least three decades, [IJs] and the BIA regularly administratively closed cases.”). -2- 2018), overruled by Matter of Cruz-Valdez, 28 I&N Dec. 326, 326 (AG 2021), the BIA explained that it “lack[ed] authority to grant administrative closure in most cases, including this situation.”3 Admin. R. at 103. Petitioners then filed a motion relying on Matter of Sanchez Sosa, 25 I&N Dec. 807 (BIA 2012), requesting that the BIA reopen the case and remand it to the IJ so Petitioners could seek a continuance pending adjudication of their U visa application. The BIA denied that …
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