[00:00:37] Speaker 00:
Good morning, your honors.

[00:00:38] Speaker 00:
Jordan Bach from Goodman Proctor representing the petitioner, Mr. Cronza-Flores.

[00:00:43] Speaker 00:
I'll aim to reserve three minutes for rebuttal and I'll watch the clock.

[00:00:48] Speaker 00:
Mr. Cronza-Flores experienced a textbook case of political persecution.

[00:00:53] Speaker 00:
He was violently beaten for refusing to buy votes for the FMLN political party after he told his FMLN attackers that he would not help them precisely because he was a member of the rival political party running to unseat them in the upcoming elections.

[00:01:08] Speaker 00:
Under this court's case law and common sense, that is plainly persecution on account of political opinion.

[00:01:14] Speaker 03:
What do you do with the Santa case, S-A-N-T-A, which

[00:01:21] Speaker 03:
by my read holds that if you volunteer your political affiliation to persecutors, schools out.

[00:01:33] Speaker 00:
I don't think that's correct, Your Honor, and I don't think that can be squared with the sweep of this court's case law.

[00:01:38] Speaker 00:
I think, you know, the way I'd interpret it is you need to view the statement in the

[00:01:43] Speaker 00:
in that some total of the circumstances and then perceive how the attackers are responding to that statement.

[00:01:49] Speaker 00:
But I think, you know, I point to this court's en banc opinion in Borja in particular is recognizing, you know, there the applicant very clearly made a voluntary statement of her political opinion.

[00:01:59] Speaker 00:
She was targeted for economic extortion and she, with no prompting from the attackers, volunteered that she

[00:02:06] Speaker 00:
was in favor of the government and she was being attacked by the New People's Republic, which is an anti-government group.

[00:02:12] Speaker 00:
And there what happened is the court then looked at the totality of the circumstances and looked at the response from the attackers and said, you know, there was then an escalation in behavior, an escalation in violence from the attackers.

[00:02:23] Speaker 00:
They pulled out a gun.

[00:02:26] Speaker 00:
implication from that evidence is that they were responding to her political opinion.

[00:02:31] Speaker 00:
I think the court made the same statement in Parsimova, pointing out there that if you have the language with increase in severity after a discussion of the attackers,

[00:02:40] Speaker 00:
political motivation, then that likewise shows that the attackers are being motivated by political opinion.

[00:02:46] Speaker 00:
So I think, you know, I read the decision as saying you need to look at the totality of the circumstances and the response.

[00:02:52] Speaker 00:
It's not enough just that someone who's being attacked makes a statement in favor of their political opinion.

[00:02:58] Speaker 00:
But here we very much have evidence of a response from the attackers.

[00:03:03] Speaker 00:
So Mr. Cronzafloris,

[00:03:05] Speaker 00:
shares his political opinion directly.

[00:03:07] Speaker 00:
He tells his attackers in the first February attack, I can't help, I won't help you support the FMLN party.

[00:03:13] Speaker 00:
I specifically belong to the rival party that's running against your party in the upcoming election.

[00:03:19] Speaker 00:
We then have two follow-on attacks of increasing severity.

[00:03:22] Speaker 00:
In the second attack, the FMLN attackers, this is one week before the election, pull Mr. Cronzo-Flores into their truck.

[00:03:30] Speaker 00:
They demand that he buy votes for them.

[00:03:32] Speaker 00:
Again, votes that are going to help

[00:03:34] Speaker 00:
their party and come out of his party's vote in the upcoming election.

[00:03:38] Speaker 00:
And when he refuses, they slash his fingers, he needs 20 stitches, and they give him three days to help with their vote buying scheme or they threaten to kill him and this time kill his family.

[00:03:48] Speaker 00:
And then we have the third attack

[00:03:50] Speaker 00:
which takes place after the election.

[00:03:52] Speaker 00:
So at that point, I think the immediate motivation to help the FMLN party has passed, and the FMLN attackers nevertheless track him to a different district in El Salvador and shoot at him with a gun.

[00:04:04] Speaker 00:
So I think given that sweep of circumstances, this is very different from a case where you merely have someone volunteer a political statement and you don't have the requisite reaction.

[00:04:16] Speaker 00:
I think the other point I'd make here, which goes to your question about Santa, is I think this case is really different from a lot of the recruitment cases because of the intertwined nature of the motivations here.

[00:04:28] Speaker 00:
Just to set out the context, the first two attacks happened in February and March of 2012.

[00:04:33] Speaker 00:
There was an election happening on March 11th of 2012 where the CN party, the party that Mr. Carranza-Felores belongs to,

[00:04:40] Speaker 00:
is running to unseat the FMLN party, which at that point had the mayor.

[00:04:45] Speaker 00:
Mr. Cronzo-Flores is highly visible with the CN party.

[00:04:48] Speaker 00:
This is on AR 130 and 140 and 141.

[00:04:52] Speaker 00:
He goes door to door to collect signatures.

[00:04:54] Speaker 00:
His entire family had been at meetings.

[00:04:57] Speaker 00:
He went to seven to eight meetings over a period of four to five months before the election, at which he is visibly helping out.

[00:05:03] Speaker 00:
So I think he is highly associated with the party.

[00:05:06] Speaker 00:
And then on top of that, we have a situation where

[00:05:09] Speaker 00:
You know, the FMLN attackers are pursuing him.

[00:05:11] Speaker 00:
They want him to buy votes to help their party.

[00:05:14] Speaker 00:
But their party is running against his party in the upcoming election.

[00:05:17] Speaker 00:
That is happening one week after the second attack.

[00:05:21] Speaker 00:
I think this is very different from a lot of the standard recruitment cases where you don't have sort of the flip side of the coin that the person they're attempting to recruit has this interest that is directly antagonistic to the attackers.

[00:05:34] Speaker 00:
You know, so to the extent that

[00:05:36] Speaker 00:
We have the extortion plus line of cases that came up in Alfaro Manzano.

[00:05:39] Speaker 00:
It comes up in Borja.

[00:05:41] Speaker 00:
It came up in a series of cases.

[00:05:43] Speaker 00:
This is, in some sense, recruitment plus.

[00:05:46] Speaker 00:
Yes, they were trying to recruit him.

[00:05:47] Speaker 00:
They wanted him to buy votes.

[00:05:49] Speaker 00:
But that was inextricably intertwined with their antagonism toward his party, which was running to unseat their own party in the election that was about to happen.

[00:05:58] Speaker 00:
So I think there's two ways to think about how to approach the nexus analysis in this case.

[00:06:04] Speaker 00:
The first is what I was just discussing, that really these two motivations are flip sides of the same coin.

[00:06:10] Speaker 00:
We're talking about the same thing, and you can't think about assisting the FMLN party and buying votes for the FMLN party without also thinking about the antipathy towards his party, the CN party that's running to unseat him.

[00:06:24] Speaker 00:
But I think putting that aside, even if the court views them as two distinct motivations, the error here is similar to the error that occurred in Alfaro Manzano.

[00:06:35] Speaker 00:
The fact that the FMLN attackers are motivated to help their own party is not the end of the analysis.

[00:06:42] Speaker 00:
This court has made clear in Alfaro Manzano and Parasimova in a series of cases that

[00:06:47] Speaker 00:
The fact that an unprotected ground also formed a motivation is not the end of the analysis.

[00:06:54] Speaker 00:
You need to consider the full circumstances.

[00:06:56] Speaker 00:
And here, even assuming we have two distinct motivations, and even assuming that pushing Mr. Carranza-Flores to buy votes for the FMLN party is not a protected ground,

[00:07:08] Speaker 00:
that still you need to consider the evidence that they were the attackers were coming after Mr. Kronza-Flores because of his political opinion specifically.

[00:07:17] Speaker 00:
And that goes back to the evidence I discussed at the beginning of

[00:07:20] Speaker 00:
Mr. Cronzafloras' direct statement of his own political opinion, the extensive evidence of his involvement with the political party, and then the escalating series of events that we see happen in the February attack, the March attack, and then the late August, early September attack that occurred in a different district.

[00:07:38] Speaker 00:
So I think regardless of which way the court approaches it, I think here

[00:07:43] Speaker 00:
It is clear that there is sufficient evidence in the record to compel the conclusion that Mr. Cronza-Flores was persecuted on account of his political opinion, and that satisfies the nexus standard that formed the sole basis of the board's decision here.

[00:07:57] Speaker 03:
You want to speak to the different standards for asylum and withholding of removal?

[00:08:05] Speaker 00:
Yes.

[00:08:05] Speaker 00:
Thank you, Judge Hawkins.

[00:08:06] Speaker 00:
So after Mr. Cronzoflores filed his initial opening brief in this case, this court decided Borja Romera, in which the court said that while asylum is governed by the one central reason standard, withholding of removal is still subject to the a reason standard.

[00:08:22] Speaker 00:
So the protected ground needs to be a reason for persecution.

[00:08:26] Speaker 00:
It doesn't need to be one central reason.

[00:08:28] Speaker 00:
And so the analysis in Parsimova and the line of, excuse me, the analysis in Borja and the cases that surrounded it

[00:08:36] Speaker 00:
The analysis that has been abrogated with respect to asylum still very much applies with respect to withholding.

[00:08:43] Speaker 00:
You know, we think here there's ample evidence to show that his involvement with the CN party was one central reason for purposes of asylum, but I think at an absolute minimum it shows that it was a reason sufficient for withholding of removal.

[00:08:56] Speaker 00:
And I think for that reason the board's piggybacking analysis here doesn't work and can't stand and I think

[00:09:03] Speaker 00:
You know, again, I think we think the evidence is sufficient to show that he has satisfied asylum.

[00:09:07] Speaker 00:
But at a minimum, taking this record, it is very difficult for me to see how his involvement in the rival political party that is running against the FMLN party wasn't at least a reason, particularly given all the circumstantial evidence, you know, just on AR 127, 128 in particular, and 130, 132.

[00:09:25] Speaker 00:
I mean, he is being stopped leaving CN party events.

[00:09:29] Speaker 00:
The first, the February attack occurs when he's leaving a CN party event.

[00:09:33] Speaker 00:
The March 4th attack occurs when he's leaving the event that was the capstone of the election season for the CN party sort of marked the end of campaigning.

[00:09:41] Speaker 00:
It's one week before the election.

[00:09:43] Speaker 00:
So I think taking those circumstances into account, it's clear that his involvement in the CN party was at least a reason, if not a central reason.

[00:09:54] Speaker 00:
I think given that, we'd urge the court here to hold as a first option that Mr. Crowns of Flores has satisfied the NEXUS standard for both asylum and withholding of removal.

[00:10:03] Speaker 00:
But at a minimum, I think this case needs to go back down to the board to apply the correct standard.

[00:10:08] Speaker 00:
If the court has no further questions at this time, I'll reserve my time for rebuttal.

[00:10:11] Speaker 02:
Very well.

[00:10:11] Speaker 02:
Thank you.

[00:10:12] Speaker 00:
Thank you.

[00:10:26] Speaker 01:
Good morning.

[00:10:26] Speaker 01:
Ted Durant for the United States.

[00:10:28] Speaker 01:
May it please the court.

[00:10:30] Speaker 01:
Petitioner failed to meet his burden of proof for either asylum or withholding of removal because he did not provide any evidence that the members of the FLMN were motivated by his political opinion at all.

[00:10:41] Speaker 01:
Now, he certainly showed that they were aware of his political opinion based on what he told them, but he did not connect the dots.

[00:10:49] Speaker 01:
Awareness does not equate to motivation.

[00:10:51] Speaker 01:
And on this record alone, he has not shown

[00:10:54] Speaker 01:
that the FMLN members were motivated at all by this opinion.

[00:11:00] Speaker 01:
And it's easily distinguishable from the Alfaro case that the court asked the attorneys to consider.

[00:11:07] Speaker 01:
Now, Alfaro is a very different case.

[00:11:10] Speaker 01:
What you have here is someone who's tremendously devoted to Jehovah's Witnesses.

[00:11:14] Speaker 01:
He's given his life to it, actually goes back to El Salvador so he can preach on the streets to everyone.

[00:11:19] Speaker 01:
And he'll talk to everyone gang members alike.

[00:11:21] Speaker 01:
Now, the gang members do not like these Jehovah Witnesses in particular because they take these kids who would otherwise be gang members and teaches them that religion is good and takes them away from what they want them to be, as gangsters.

[00:11:36] Speaker 01:
These gang members in Alfaro, as opposed to this case, first time they see the guy, they're insulting him.

[00:11:43] Speaker 01:
They're insulting his religion.

[00:11:44] Speaker 01:
They say, if you practice your faith, we're going to hurt you.

[00:11:48] Speaker 01:
We have nothing here.

[00:11:50] Speaker 01:
In this case here, we have the four party members of the FMLN.

[00:11:57] Speaker 01:
They approach petitioner.

[00:11:58] Speaker 01:
They say, you're going to work for us.

[00:12:00] Speaker 01:
He ignores them.

[00:12:01] Speaker 01:
They don't like being ignored.

[00:12:02] Speaker 01:
And if they said, if you don't work for us,

[00:12:06] Speaker 01:
We're going to hurt you."

[00:12:06] Speaker 01:
And he said, well, I can't, and I'm paraphrasing now.

[00:12:10] Speaker 01:
If you, I can't work for you.

[00:12:12] Speaker 01:
I'm with the, with the CN party, which is a fledgling party that petitioner collected signatures for when the... Does that matter?

[00:12:22] Speaker 01:
Yes, sir.

[00:12:22] Speaker 01:
It was the, the, the, the CN party was an offshoot of the, of the, I believe the PCN party.

[00:12:27] Speaker 03:
Well, it doesn't matter whether it's a fledgling party or one that's on the precipice of taking control of government.

[00:12:36] Speaker 01:
What I'm saying is I'm looking at the entire record, sir, as a whole, and there's no record evidence, particularly the country condition evidence of a rivalry that these FMLN members persecute CN members.

[00:12:53] Speaker 01:
Now, if there's a rivalry anywhere in El Salvador, it's between the arena party, at least in 2012, and the FMLN party.

[00:13:01] Speaker 01:
And in Alfaro, you least have some country condition evidence that shows or expert witness that shows that these gang members really don't like these street preachers, especially Jehovah's Witnesses.

[00:13:14] Speaker 01:
And by the way, Jehovah's Witnesses are easily identifiable because they wear a suit and tie when they preach as opposed to anybody else.

[00:13:21] Speaker 01:
There's nothing here indicating that when these, and on this record alone, if there was a few changes here, I would agree with petitioner, but it's his burden to prove it.

[00:13:30] Speaker 01:
And what we have is three incidents where even after he mentions that he can't help them because he's in the CN party, we don't have one insult, one nothing.

[00:13:40] Speaker 01:
They had the opportunity when they went after him the second time, and they said nothing about that.

[00:13:46] Speaker 01:
Petitioner was afraid because he ignored them.

[00:13:49] Speaker 01:
They were mad at him because he ignored them.

[00:13:51] Speaker 01:
He wasn't buying into their vote buying scheme.

[00:13:54] Speaker 01:
His political opinion, based on this record, means nothing.

[00:13:58] Speaker 01:
to these party members.

[00:14:01] Speaker 01:
And if you look at everything, the record as a whole, you don't have the gang members mentioning his religion, unlike a case like Borja, where the lady mentioned that she was opposed to the Shining Path or was in a different party, and they showed visible anger to her political opinion.

[00:14:20] Speaker 01:
And that's not the case here.

[00:14:21] Speaker 01:
That's not the case here.

[00:14:23] Speaker 01:
We have an escalation of violence, but that doesn't show motive at all.

[00:14:26] Speaker 01:
Not at all.

[00:14:27] Speaker 01:
We also don't have anything in the record from his buddy or his friend, Juan Anselmo.

[00:14:32] Speaker 01:
Apparently, when petitioner helped the CN party, he went with six or seven other folks.

[00:14:37] Speaker 01:
There's nothing in the record that shows that these people were persecuted.

[00:14:41] Speaker 01:
There's nothing that shows that these party members went after them.

[00:14:45] Speaker 01:
Nothing from Juan Anselmo that shows that these other five people were treated similarly.

[00:14:49] Speaker 01:
So it's a one-off.

[00:14:51] Speaker 01:
In addition, as I said before, no country condition evidence that shows that this

[00:14:57] Speaker 01:
particular party goes after this particular party that that petitioner was a member of so it's his burden to show it and the evidence must be compelling and I I submit to you that if there was a couple things here different I would have asked the court to remand if they had said during the attack you know why aren't you helping us oh by the way you're just some punk from the CN party that's something if petitioner when asked why did they go after you

[00:15:23] Speaker 01:
rather than saying, because I ignored them, because I gaffed them off, because they were mad at me, if he said, well, I suspect that maybe it was because of my party, maybe because I was wearing a CN t-shirt, there's no evidence of that, maybe I had a CN hat, nothing like that.

[00:15:39] Speaker 01:
I mean, maybe reasonable minds can differ, but it has to be compelling.

[00:15:43] Speaker 01:
And I submit to you on this record, it is not based on the country condition evidence, based on petitioner's testimony, based on what these members said to him.

[00:15:54] Speaker 01:
And lastly, there's no evidence at all that they tracked him anywhere.

[00:15:58] Speaker 01:
It could have been just a fortuity.

[00:16:01] Speaker 01:
They saw him in a public area.

[00:16:03] Speaker 01:
He hasn't said he's got any identifying party

[00:16:07] Speaker 01:
clothes on at all.

[00:16:08] Speaker 01:
And when he goes to the third incident, when he goes to the town that's no longer, I think, in San Mateo, there's no evidence that these guys track them.

[00:16:17] Speaker 01:
At most, you see guys with masks on their face, and they fire an air round at him.

[00:16:22] Speaker 01:
Now, it could be anything, but I submit based on common sense and experience, if somebody wants to track you from A to B,

[00:16:33] Speaker 01:
they're going to see you before you see them.

[00:16:34] Speaker 01:
And it's going to be more than an errant round.

[00:16:36] Speaker 01:
So, but the evidence doesn't show anything, any tracking.

[00:16:40] Speaker 01:
And even if they had tracked them, it doesn't show motivation at all.

[00:16:44] Speaker 01:
So this case is easily distinguishable from Alfaro.

[00:16:47] Speaker 01:
And I'd like to draw the court's attention.

[00:16:50] Speaker 01:
I just saw the case last night because it was, I guess it was published November 5th.

[00:16:56] Speaker 01:
I was reading it this morning and Judge Oman was the author of the case.

[00:17:00] Speaker 01:
And it's a very unfortunate case.

[00:17:02] Speaker 01:
uh... roses roman and i didn't twenty eight j because i didn't have time but here you have it's very unfortunate case where women is is sexually assaulted by uh...

[00:17:11] Speaker 01:
by gang members, I believe in Mexico.

[00:17:14] Speaker 01:
And the issue is whether or not they're just thugs or they hold anti-women opinion.

[00:17:20] Speaker 01:
Well, during the sexual assault, they said things like slurs against women, and in addition, they didn't rob her, they only sexually assaulted her.

[00:17:28] Speaker 01:
So that is evidence that they cared about the fact that she's a woman, and we have nothing there.

[00:17:33] Speaker 01:
Not even a slur from these guys.

[00:17:35] Speaker 01:
And if we'd had that, if we'd had something that indicates

[00:17:39] Speaker 01:
that this particular party has any interest as a political opinion, I wouldn't be here right now.

[00:17:45] Speaker 03:
So if... Does your friend on the other side have the citation you just referred to?

[00:17:50] Speaker 01:
Uh, no, sir.

[00:17:50] Speaker 01:
No, sir.

[00:17:51] Speaker 01:
I do apologize for that.

[00:17:52] Speaker 01:
I wasn't, uh, but I can give that right now.

[00:17:55] Speaker 03:
Uh, but it's just, uh, it was an unpleasant citation down on a piece of paper.

[00:17:59] Speaker 01:
I sure will.

[00:17:59] Speaker 01:
And I didn't, I'm not trying to sandbag anybody.

[00:18:01] Speaker 01:
I just saw it this morning and I saw that judge Owens was the author of it.

[00:18:04] Speaker 01:
So I figured, well, I think, I think it was a mem dispo.

[00:18:07] Speaker 02:
So I think the panel issues though, I'm not sure I can claim full credit for it, but I'm, I'm aware of the case.

[00:18:12] Speaker 02:
Yes, very much so.

[00:18:13] Speaker 01:
Okay.

[00:18:14] Speaker 01:
If that one a couple of weeks ago, if there's nothing else, this, this concludes my presentation.

[00:18:18] Speaker 01:
If the court has no questions of me.

[00:18:20] Speaker 01:
Thank you very much.

[00:18:21] Speaker 01:
Thank you, counsel.

[00:18:30] Speaker 00:
Thank you, your honors.

[00:18:31] Speaker 00:
I'm not familiar with that case, but I'm happy I will, of course, review it and then submit a letter to the court.

[00:18:36] Speaker 00:
But there are a couple of points I wanted to touch on from the government's argument.

[00:18:39] Speaker 00:
First, the idea of this fledgling party, I think, as a legal matter, doesn't make any difference.

[00:18:45] Speaker 00:
I also think here

[00:18:46] Speaker 00:
these two parties are running against each other in a political election, but the CN party won that mayoral election happening in May 2012.

[00:18:53] Speaker 00:
The CN ousted the FMLN mayor.

[00:18:55] Speaker 00:
So I think the question of the primary rivalry between the FMLN and the ARENA party was not what was happening in this particular town.

[00:19:03] Speaker 00:
Second, just going back to the gang cases and Senga which Judge Hawkins brought up, I think what those stand for is violence plus disparity of views is not enough.

[00:19:13] Speaker 00:
If you have

[00:19:14] Speaker 00:
a group, whether it's a political group or a gang, engaging in indiscriminate violence, the fact that some of the people swept up in that have different views is not enough.

[00:19:23] Speaker 00:
But that is very different from what is happening here.

[00:19:25] Speaker 00:
I can't stress this enough that these attacks are happening weeks before a political election between these two particular parties

[00:19:33] Speaker 00:
Mr. Cronza-Flores is tracked coming out of CN party events, both the first and the second time.

[00:19:38] Speaker 00:
They are asking him to buy votes for the FMLN party, knowing after the first attack, there's no question they're aware of his political affiliation.

[00:19:49] Speaker 00:
They know he belongs to the party that's on the other side of the election, and they're asking him to buy votes.

[00:19:54] Speaker 00:
Those votes are coming out of his party.

[00:19:56] Speaker 00:
That's what's on the other side.

[00:19:58] Speaker 00:
So I think this is very different from the gang cases in that sense.

[00:20:02] Speaker 00:
And I think it's helpful if you read those cases to see how different they are.

[00:20:07] Speaker 00:
And I think it shows the flaw in the board's reasoning.

[00:20:10] Speaker 00:
These are the cases that are being cited by the board and by the government.

[00:20:13] Speaker 00:
In Santos-Limas, this court said,

[00:20:15] Speaker 00:
The applicant did not present evidence that he was politically or ideologically opposed to the gang.

[00:20:20] Speaker 00:
That's not true here.

[00:20:21] Speaker 00:
Mr. Cronzaflor specifically said, I can't help you.

[00:20:24] Speaker 00:
I belong to the other party.

[00:20:26] Speaker 00:
In this court's decision in Ramos Lopez, the court said, the applicant alleged no facts in support of a political opinion beyond his refusal to join the gang.

[00:20:35] Speaker 00:
Again, very different from what happened here.

[00:20:37] Speaker 00:
And then there's the board's decision in matter of SEG, where the board said there is

[00:20:41] Speaker 00:
no evidence in the record that the respondents were politically active or made any anti-gang political statements.

[00:20:47] Speaker 00:
You know, that's a decision the board is relying on here to show why it is it doesn't think Mr. Carranza-Flores satisfied the nexus requirement, but that looks nothing like what is happening here.

[00:20:58] Speaker 00:
Mr. Cronzafloris was very politically active.

[00:21:01] Speaker 00:
His respondents were clearly aware of that, if not on the first attack, certainly the second and third attacks.

[00:21:07] Speaker 00:
So I think that really shows that the board did not engage in the correct legal analysis here.

[00:21:11] Speaker 00:
At a minimum, the analysis it should have gone through is the same analysis the court outlined in Alfaro Manzano, where it needed to consider whether Mr. Cronzafloris' political affiliation would itself have been a sufficient reason for the attacks.

[00:21:26] Speaker 00:
And I think we do think the evidence here is

[00:21:29] Speaker 00:
so substantial that it compels the conclusion that the nexus standard was satisfied, but at a minimum I think the case needs to go back down to the board for the board to apply the reasoning that this court outlined in Alfaro Manzano.

[00:21:42] Speaker 00:
Also note that

[00:21:46] Speaker 00:
I think the question here about what it is, what type of evidence it is that needs to be seen, you know, the board and the government are expressly, you know, are in effect imposing a sort of an express statement requirement that you need some sort of statement from the attackers.

[00:22:00] Speaker 00:
And, you know, the government said this case would be different if they had referred to Mr. Cronzafloris' political opinion.

[00:22:06] Speaker 00:
This court has repeatedly held that you don't need a statement from the attackers and has said, you know, we can't expect

[00:22:14] Speaker 00:
attackers to sort of narrate their motives in real time.

[00:22:17] Speaker 00:
This court just said that in June in Al-Rakabi.

[00:22:19] Speaker 00:
It said it in Parasomova.

[00:22:21] Speaker 00:
It's come up over and over again that you have to look at the totality of the circumstances.

[00:22:26] Speaker 00:
You know, in Borja, there was also not a statement from the attackers there that they were opposed to the applicant's political opinion.

[00:22:34] Speaker 00:
You see an escalation in their behavior, but I think as the government recognized, we also see an escalation in behavior here.

[00:22:41] Speaker 00:
We had the first attack where Mr. Cronza-Flores is himself threatened, but there's no violence, there's no threat against his family.

[00:22:48] Speaker 00:
Then in the second attack, we see a huge jump in that he is pulled into their truck, he's sliced with a knife, he needs 20 stitches, and they escalate their attacks.

[00:22:58] Speaker 00:
They give him a three-day timeline to buy votes or the attackers will kill, they said, both him and his family.

[00:23:05] Speaker 00:
And then we have the third incident where the election has passed.

[00:23:08] Speaker 00:
They no longer have the motivation to buy votes for their own party.

[00:23:12] Speaker 00:
And still, he's tracked to a different district he's shot at.

[00:23:15] Speaker 00:
And I know the government is questioning now whether those are the same attackers.

[00:23:19] Speaker 00:
But the board accepted that it was the same people who were tracking him.

[00:23:23] Speaker 00:
So I don't think there's any factual question on the board's opinion whether that was of a piece and part of the same attacks.

[00:23:30] Speaker 00:
So I think just to close, I'd emphasize, I think this case is really unique.

[00:23:34] Speaker 00:
It is categorically different from the recruitment cases, given the context of the upcoming election that was happening, the two rival parties, the ample evidence of Mr. Carranza-Flores' involvement in the CN party.

[00:23:46] Speaker 00:
And for that reason, we'd urge the court to hold that the NEXUS standard is satisfied or, at a minimum, to remand to the board to conduct the analysis.

[00:23:53] Speaker 00:
Thank you, Your Honors.

[00:23:54] Speaker 02:
Right on time, Ms.

[00:23:55] Speaker 02:
Bach.

[00:23:57] Speaker 02:
Thank you both for your very fine briefing and argument in this case.

[00:24:00] Speaker 02:
It's much appreciated.

[00:24:01] Speaker 02:
This matter is submitted.