Acevedo v. Lynch, No. 12-71237 (9th Cir. 2015)
Annotate this CasePetitioner seeks review of the BIA's dismissal of his appeal of the IJ's decision denying petitioner's claim to derivative citizenship and ordering him removed. Petitioner claims that he has derivative citizenship under 8 U.S.C. 1431(a) from his United States citizen stepfather. The court held that, under Mater of Guzman-Gomez, the definition of “child” in section 1101(c)(1) does not include stepchildren. Further, canons of construction, as well as the legislative history of the section, which the court used as an interpretive tool to understand Congress’s purpose in enacting it, lead the court to reject petitioner's claim that the reference in section 1101(b)(1) contained in section 1431(b) should be read also to apply to section 1431(a). Accordingly, the court denied the petition.
Court Description: Immigration. The panel denied Edson Acevedo’s petition for review of the Board of Immigration Appeals’ decision denying his claim that he derived citizenship from his United States citizen stepfather. The panel held that Acevedo did not derive citizenship under 8 U.S.C. § 1431(a) from his stepfather, who married his non-citizen mother after he was born and never adopted him. The panel found that the BIA correctly concluded in Matter of Guzman-Gomez, 24 I. & N. Dec. 824 (BIA 2009), that the definition of “child” in § 1101(c)(1), the portion of the Immigration and Nationality Act that applies to citizenship and naturalization, does not include stepchildren. The panel also found that Congress did not intend § 1101(b)’s definition of child, which does include stepchildren, to apply to § 1431(a).
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