Immigration – Nexus – Waiver

Listen to this article

Where applications for asylum and withholding of removal were denied on the ground that the applicant had failed to show the required nexus between the harm she experienced and her asserted protected status, the applicant’s petition for review must be denied because of her failure to make any developed argument as to why the nexus determination was incorrect.

“Petitioner Rosa Lidia Cante Mijangos, a citizen of Guatemala, suffered sexual and physical abuse at the hands of her former intimate partner for years. Fearing for her safety, she fled to the United States in 2014 and eventually applied for asylum and withholding of removal. … The Immigration Judge (IJ) rejected her claims after concluding that Cante Mijangos had failed to show the required connection or ‘nexus’ between the harm she experienced and her asserted protected status as a ‘Guatemalan woman who was unable to effectively leave a domestic relationship.’ Instead, the IJ found that her ex-partner abused her because of his generally violent nature. The Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) affirmed, and Cante Mijangos petitioned our Court for review. Although we do not minimize the harm that Cante Mijangos experienced, we must deny the petition because she has failed to develop any challenge to the legal and factual bases for the BIA’s ruling. …

“Cante Mijangos began a relationship with her former partner, Walter, in 2007. …

“Our analysis begins and ends with waiver.

“The BIA’s decision focuses on the nexus requirement. Specifically, the BIA concluded that the IJ did not clearly err in finding that Cante Mijangos had failed to establish any nexus between the persecution she experienced in Guatemala and her asserted PSG. Thus, the BIA affirmed the IJ’s determination that ‘the abuse [Cante Mijangos] suffered’ was ‘motivated by her former partner’s violent and abusive nature’ rather than ‘any desire to overcome a characteristic of’ her asserted PSG.

“Yet, in her petition, Cante Mijangos fails to grapple with this critical ruling by the BIA. Although she asserts that ‘the record compels the conclusion that she suffered past persecution … on account of being a Guatemalan woman,’ and refers to her testimony regarding the abuse she experienced ‘at the hands of her ex-partner,’ she fails to advance any record-based argument connecting Walter’s abuse to her asserted PSG. Nor does she lodge a legal challenge to the IJ’s application of our mixed-motive precedent.

“To be sure, Cante Mijangos contends in her petition that the agency erred when it did ‘not explain why the harm and abuse’ she experienced ‘was not sufficiently related to her status as a Guatemalan woman that was subjected to gender and sexual violence due to her membership in this particular group.’ But the remainder of her petition does not develop this contention with any legal or factual support whatsoever. Our precedent makes clear that ‘issues adverted to in a perfunctory manner, unaccompanied by some effort at developed argumentation, are deemed waived.’ …

“Instead of addressing the basis for the agency’s ruling, Cante Mijangos focuses her petition on a separate issue: the legal cognizability of her asserted PSG. The only substantial argument Cante Mijangos makes in her petition is that the group ‘Guatemalan women’ is immutable, particular, and socially distinct, citing to evidence of gender-based violence in Guatemala. But whether ‘Guatemalan women’ is a legally valid PSG is not at issue in this case.

“And, regardless of the asserted PSG, Cante Mijangos’s failure to make any developed argument as to why the agency’s nexus determination was incorrect is necessarily fatal to her claims. … Her failure to challenge the agency’s nexus ruling also dooms her withholding of removal claim. …”

Cante Mijangos v. Bondi (Lawyers Weekly No. 01-032-26) (11 pages) (Rikelman, J.) Lidia M. Sanchez for the petitioner; Marie V. Robinson, with whom Brett A. Shumate and Cindy S. Ferrier were on brief, for the respondent (Docket No. 25-1267) (Feb. 18, 2026).

Click here to read the full text of the opinion.