The Board of Immigration Appeals on February 7, 2014 released a twin set of decisions—Matter of M-E-V-G-, 26 I&N Dec. 227 (BIA 2014) and –, Matter of W-G-Rec. 20 26 I&N Dec.20 (BIA 2014)— in which it repackaged what constitutes a “particular social group.” In order for someone to obtain asylum, she must prove that she has a well-founded fear of persecution based on religion, nationality, race, political opinion, and particular social group. Survivors of domestic violence must fashion themselves into a “particular social group” to be considered for asylum since gender is not included as a separate category. Prior to these decisions, a group such as “married Guatemalan women unable to leave their relationships” would be considered a “particular social group,” if it can be shown that the group (1) is composed of members who share a common immutable characteristic, (2) is defined with particularity, and (3) has “social visibility.” The Board’s recent decisions changed the requirement of “social visibility” to “social distinction.”
Many have pointed out that victims of domestic violence found the “social visibility” requirement difficult to satisfy, because such victims are not typically clearly visible in society. (See for example, Fatima Marouf, “The Emerging Importance of Social Visibility in Defining Particular Social Group, 27 Yale Policy Review 47(2008)). In adopting the “social distinction” concept, the Board rejected the UNHCR and other advocates’ position that the Board return to the test it articulated in 1985 in Matter of Acosta, which included only the immutable characteristics requirement. In other words, they wanted the Board to remove the “particularity” and “social visibility” requirements all together. In response to the new Board decisions, the National Immigrant Justice Center recently issued a statement saying that “the new BIA decisions undermine U.S. obligations to protect asylum seekers.”
Claiming asylum for domestic violence survivors is like putting a square peg in a round hole. The standard for asylum used in the United States comes from the 1951 UN Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, which never anticipated these kinds of claims. Acknowledging that domestic violence should entitle someone from asylum, in 2000, the DOJ proposed regulations that articulated clearer asylum standards. However, to date no final regulations have been released.
Whether or not the standards articulated in the new BIA decisions will benefit survivors of domestic violence is not entirely clear, but there is at least one success story. The Cleveland immigration court applied the new standards to grant asylum to a domestic victim. The opinion entered on February 24, 2014. To view the Cleveland case click here. The truth is that there will continue to be inconsistent immigration judge decisions and those domestic violence victims who appeal will be placed in limbo by the Board until the U.S. government articulates a coherent policy.
This piece was re-posted from a new blog called “Human Rights at Home” which can be found at: http://lawprofessors.typepad.com/human_rights/2014/03/domestic-violence-survivors-and-board-of-immigration-appeals.html
IntLawGrrls 
Reblogged this on Beers, Balls and Bacchae and commented:
Based on recent experience, its possible the Board of Immigration Appeals also solidified specific reasons to deny asylum based on such claims. Recently, Immigration Judges have put undue burden on many women to prove that authorities in origin countries will not help or assist women in domestic relationships by required affirmative actions to have been taken – even to the extent of asking female respondents why they had not asked other male family members to intervene or to ask their abusers to meet them in public places.
For many immigration judges and asylum officers, it appears that there is a serious misunderstanding of the perils of domestic abuse in a traditionally patriarchal society and how certain actions can cause further escalation of abuse rather than protection.