FOR PUBLICATION UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT PEDRO TOMAS PEREZ PEREZ, No. 18-35123 Plaintiff-Appellant, D.C. No. v. 2:17-cv-00249- JLR CHAD F. WOLF, Acting Secretary of Homeland Security; BARBARA Q. VELARDE, Chief of the OPINION Administrative Appeals Office for USCIS; MARK KOUMANS, Acting Director of USCIS; LAURA B. ZUCHOWSKI, Director of the USCIS Vermont Service Center, Defendants-Appellees. Appeal from the United States District Court for the Western District of Washington James L. Robart, District Judge, Presiding Argued and Submitted April 9, 2019 Seattle, Washington Filed November 22, 2019 Before: William A. Fletcher, Consuelo M. Callahan, and Morgan Christen, Circuit Judges. 2 PEREZ PEREZ V. WOLF Opinion by Judge W. Fletcher; Dissent by Judge Callahan SUMMARY* Immigration The panel reversed the district court’s dismissal for lack of jurisdiction of Pedro Tomas Perez Perez’s suit challenging the denial of his U visa petition, holding that neither § 701(a)(2) of the Administrative Procedure Act (“APA”), nor 8 U.S.C. § 1252(a)(2)(B)(ii) – both of which preclude review of certain discretionary agency decisions – barred review of Perez’s claims under the APA. To be eligible for a U visa, a petitioner must establish that he or she has suffered substantial physical or mental abuse from having been a victim of qualifying criminal activity, possesses information about that activity, and has been helpful, is being helpful, or is likely to be helpful to an authority investigating or prosecuting that activity. The United States Citizenship and Immigration Service (“USCIS”) denied Perez’s U visa petition on the ground that he had not shown that he was a victim of a qualifying crime. Perez challenged that decision in the district court, which concluded that his action was not reviewable under APA § 701(a)(2). * This summary constitutes no part of the opinion of the court. It has been prepared by court staff for the convenience of the reader. PEREZ PEREZ V. WOLF 3 The panel held that Perez’s claims were not barred by APA § 701(a)(2), which precludes judicial review of actions “committed to agency discretion by law,” where there is no judicially manageable standard by which a court can judge how the agency should exercise its discretion. Explaining that the relevant statutes establish the requirements for a U visa, as well as application procedures and agency duties, the panel concluded that the statutory framework affords meaningful standards for reviewing claims challenging USCIS’s compliance with that framework. Responding to the dissent’s argument that regulations grant USCIS “sole jurisdiction” over U visa petitions and “sole discretion” to determine the value of evidence, the panel observed that the statues themselves use no such language. The panel also explained that it does not follow from the fact that USCIS has sole jurisdiction to issue U visas that a court is without jurisdiction to review USCIS’s decision. Further, after sua sponte consideration, the panel held that 8 U.S.C. § 1252(a)(2)(B)(ii), which bars judicial review of immigration decisions or actions “the authority for which is specified under this subchapter [8 U.S.C. ...
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