Tho Huynh v. Todd Blanche

── Tho Huynh v. Todd Blanche ── Court: Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit Date: June 09, 2026 Category: General USCA4 Appeal: 25-1619 Doc: 68 Filed: 06/09/2026 Pg: 1 of 11 UNPUBLISHED UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT No. 25-1619 THO DUC HUYNH, Petitioner, v. TODD BLANCHE, Acting Attorney General, Respondent. On Petition for Review of an Order of the Board of Immigration Appeals. Argued: May 7, 2026 Decided: June 9, 2026 Before WILKINSON, RUSHING, and HEYTENS, Circuit Judges. Petition denied by unpublished opinion. Judge Heytens wrote the opinion, which Judge Wilkinson and Judge Rushing joined. ARGUED: Alex Christopher Boota, MCDERMOTT WILL & SCHULTE LLP, Washington, D.C., for Petitioner. Rodolfo David Saenz, UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, Washington, D.C., for Respondent. ON BRIEF: Simon Y. Sandoval-Moshenberg, Alaina Taylor, MURRAY OSORIO PLLC, Fairfax, Virginia; Paul W. Hughes, Sarah P. Hogarth, MCDERMOTT WILL & SCHULTE LLP, Washington, D.C., for Petitioner. Brett Shumate, Assistant Attorney General, Lindsay B. Glauner, Margot L. Carter, Office of Immigration Litigation, Civil Division, UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, Washington, D.C., for Respondent. Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit. USCA4 Appeal: 25-1619 Doc: 68 Filed: 06/09/2026 Pg: 2 of 11 TOBY HEYTENS, Circuit Judge: The Board of Immigration Appeals denied a noncitizen’s motion to reopen his removal proceedings on timeliness grounds and declined to exercise its authority to order sua sponte reopening. We deny the petition for review. I. In 1997, a state court convicted petitioner Tho Duc Huynh of violating Virginia Code § 18.2-67.4. In 2003, an immigration judge concluded that conviction rendered petitioner removable on two grounds: first, because it was an “aggravated felony” under 8 U.S.C. § 1227(a)(2)(A)(iii); and second, because it constituted a “crime involving moral turpitude” under Section 1227(a)(2)(A)(i). The Board of Immigration Appeals affirmed that decision in 2004, thus finalizing petitioner’s order of removal. See 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(47)(B); Lopez v. Bondi, 167 F.4th 223, 227 (4th Cir. 2026). Petitioner did not pursue judicial review at that point. The government did not immediately seek to remove petitioner because there was “no repatriation agreement between the United States and Vietnam” at the time. Ly v. Hansen, 351 F.3d 263, 265 n.1 (6th Cir. 2003); cf. Gov’t Rule 28(j) Ltr., ECF No. 66 (filed May 12, 2026) (asserting the government began removing “Vietnamese citizens who (like [petitioner]) entered the United States before 1995 . . . to Vietnam by at least July 2017”). Despite the final order of removal, petitioner remained in the United States for the next two decades. In 2005 and 2010, petitioner sought postconviction relief from his 1997 state-court conviction. Those efforts were unsuccessful in state trial court, and it does not appear petitioner appealed. Petitioner also did not seek to reopen his removal proceedings 2 USCA4 Appeal: 25-1619 Doc: 68 Filed: 06/09/2026 Pg: 3 of 11 between 2004 and 2025. On January 31, 2025, the government detained petitioner with plans to remove him to Vietnam. On March 21, 2025—49 days later—petitioner asked the Board to reopen his case beca