NOT PRECEDENTIAL UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT ___________ No. 20-1692 ______ MIGUEL ANGEL MELO GUTIERREZ, Petitioner v. ATTORNEY GENERAL UNITED STATES OF AMERICA ____________________________________ On Petition for Review of an Order of the Board of Immigration Appeals (A201-666-374) Immigration Judge: D’Anna H. Freeman ____________________________________ Submitted Pursuant to Third Circuit L.A.R. 34.1(a) March 17, 2021 Before: KRAUSE, PHIPPS, and FUENTES, Circuit Judges. (Filed: November 12, 2021) ___________ OPINION* ___________ * This disposition is not an opinion of the full Court and pursuant to I.O.P. 5.7 does not constitute binding precedent. PHIPPS, Circuit Judge. This immigration petition brought by Miguel Angel Melo Gutierrez, a Mexican native and national who concedes removability, involves two distinct sets of issues. The first relates to timeliness. Melo Gutierrez’s petition was due on a day when the courthouse was closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Although he filed his petition two days after that initial due date, it qualified as timely because the clerk’s office was inaccessible on those intervening days. See Fed. R. App. P. 26(a)(3)(A). The second set of issues concerns Melo Gutierrez’s requests for relief from removal. According to Melo Gutierrez, on four separate occasions while working as a taxi driver in Mexico, he succumbed to threatening demands for transportation by armed persons associated with cartels. Due to his experience as a cartel-commandeered taxi driver, Melo Gutierrez requested asylum, statutory withholding, and protection under the Convention Against Torture. The Immigration Judge rejected those claims. The Board of Immigration Appeals upheld those rulings on administrative appeal. In reviewing factual findings for substantial evidence, see Dia v. Ashcroft, 353 F.3d 228, 248 (3d Cir. 2003) (en banc), and legal issues de novo, see Denis v. Att’y Gen., 633 F.3d 201, 205 (3d Cir. 2011), we will deny the petition. I. The first issue is the timeliness of Melo Gutierrez’s petition. The BIA issued a final order of removal on February 25, 2020. By statute, a petition to review a final order of removal must be filed within thirty days of the order. See 8 U.S.C. § 1252(b)(1) (“The petition for review must be filed not later than 30 days after the date of the final order of 2 removal.”). That time limit is jurisdictional, and a petition will be dismissed if filed after the thirty-day deadline. See McAllister v. Att’y Gen., 444 F.3d 178, 185 (3d Cir. 2006) (dismissing a petition filed thirteen days late). Using a thirty-day time limit, Melo Gutierrez’s petition was due on Thursday, March 26, 2020. But he did not file his petition until Saturday, March 28. Melo Gutierrez contends that those additional two days should not count toward the thirty-day limit because the clerk’s office was inaccessible on those days due to the COVID-19 pandemic. By rule, the time to file is extended automatically during the period that the clerk’s office is “inaccessible.” Fed. R. App. P. 26(a)(3)(A) (“[I]f the clerk’s office is inaccessible . . . on the last day for filing under Rule 26(a)(1), then …
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