NOT FOR PUBLICATION FILED UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS NOV 16 2020 MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK U.S. COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT MORSHED ALAM, No. 19-72744 Petitioner, Agency No. A215-826-397 v. MEMORANDUM* WILLIAM P. BARR, Attorney General, Respondent. On Petition for Review of an Order of the Board of Immigration Appeals Submitted September 1, 2020** Seattle, Washington Before: BYBEE and COLLINS, Circuit Judges, and STEARNS,*** District Judge. Dissent by Judge COLLINS Morshed Alam, a Bangladeshi citizen, petitions for review of the decision of the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) denying his claim of asylum and * This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3. ** The panel unanimously concludes this case is suitable for decision without oral argument. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(a)(2). *** The Honorable Richard G. Stearns, United States District Judge for the District of Massachusetts, sitting by designation. withholding of removal. That decision was based on an adverse credibility determination. We have jurisdiction pursuant to 8 U.S.C. 1252(a)(2)(B)(ii). Where, as here, the BIA adopted and affirmed the Immigration Judge (IJ)’s decision pursuant to Matter of Burbano, 20 I & N Dec. 872, 874 (BIA 1994), we review the IJ’s decision as if it were the agency decision. See Kwong v. Holder, 671 F.3d 872, 876 (9th Cir. 2011). Petitioner contends that: (1) the IJ’s adverse credibility determination was not supported by substantial evidence; (2) the IJ violated his due process right to competent interpretation by drawing an adverse inference from Petitioner’s perceived English language proficiency; and (3) the IJ erred as a matter of law by conflating Petitioner’s understanding of English with a mastery of the language. We review an adverse credibility determination, as we must, “under the deferential substantial evidence standard.”1 Zhi v. Holder, 751 F.3d 1088, 1091 (9th Cir. 2014). We deny the petition for review. The IJ’s adverse credibility determination is supported by substantial evidence. Petitioner claims asylum based on his father’s membership in the Bangladesh National Party (BNP), one of the country’s opposition political parties. According to Petitioner, persons associated with the ruling Awami League attacked 1 “This strict standard bars a reviewing court from independently weighing the evidence and requires us to deny the Petition unless Petitioner [has] presented evidence so compelling that no reasonable factfinder could find that Petitioner was not credible.” Angov v. Lynch, 788 F.3d 893, 900 (9th Cir. 2015) (quoting Singh v. INS, 134 F.3d 962, 966 (9th Cir. 1998)) (internal quotation marks omitted). 2 19-72744 his father on May 30, 2015, putting him in the hospital for four days. Petitioner also states that his father went into hiding on June 15, 2015, after learning of a conspiracy to kill him. At the asylum hearing, when asked to describe his problems with the Awami League, Petitioner identified an incident that had occurred on December 16, 2016. In addition to the specific date, Petitioner recounted the setting (“I was returning home after finishing the victory ...
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