Case: 23-2200 Document: 24 Page: 1 Filed: 03/12/2024
NOTE: This disposition is nonprecedential.
United States Court of Appeals
for the Federal Circuit
______________________
RODNEY KEITH WRIGHT,
Claimant-Appellant
v.
DENIS MCDONOUGH, SECRETARY OF
VETERANS AFFAIRS,
Respondent-Appellee
______________________
2023-2200
______________________
Appeal from the United States Court of Appeals for
Veterans Claims in No. 23-196, Judge Coral Wong Pietsch.
______________________
Decided: March 12, 2024
______________________
RODNEY WRIGHT, Brooklyn, NY, pro se.
NATALEE A. ALLENBAUGH, Commercial Litigation
Branch, Civil Division, United States Department of Jus-
tice, Washington, DC, for respondent-appellee. Also repre-
sented by BRIAN M. BOYNTON, MARTIN F. HOCKEY, JR.,
PATRICIA M. MCCARTHY; BRIAN D. GRIFFIN, Office of Gen-
eral Counsel, United States Department of Veterans Af-
fairs, Washington, DC.
______________________
Case: 23-2200 Document: 24 Page: 2 Filed: 03/12/2024
2 WRIGHT v. MCDONOUGH
Before MOORE, Chief Judge, CLEVENGER and CHEN,
Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM.
Mr. Rodney Keith Wright appeals an order of the
United States Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims (Vet-
erans Court) denying in part and dismissing in part
Mr. Wright’s petition for extraordinary relief. Wright v.
McDonough, No. 23-0196, 2023 WL 4175143, at *11 (Vet.
App. June 26, 2023) (Order). We affirm the Veterans
Court’s order denying the petition and dismiss the parts of
Mr. Wright’s appeal over which we do not have jurisdiction.
BACKGROUND
Mr. Wright served in the United States Army from
June 1990 to October 1990 and in the United States Air
Force from August 2001 to October 2001. Appx. at 15–16. 1
On January 11, 2023, Mr. Wright filed with the Veter-
ans Court a petition for a writ of mandamus. Order, 2023
WL 4175143, at *1. As it pertains to this appeal, the peti-
tion principally argued that the Department of Veterans
Affairs (VA) committed clear and unmistakable error
(CUE) in determining his eligibility for Special Monthly
Compensation (SMC) benefits and alleged that the VA un-
reasonably delayed acting on an alleged April 2019 CUE
motion. Id. at *1, *6.
The Veterans Court found that issuing a writ of man-
damus was not appropriate, dismissing in part and deny-
ing in part the petition. Id. at *11. It dismissed the matter
of whether Mr. Wright was entitled to SMC benefits be-
cause he failed to exhaust his administrative remedies, id.
at *6–7, and it denied Mr. Wright’s request to compel VA
1 “Appx.” refers to the appendix filed concurrently
with Respondent’s brief.
Case: 23-2200 Document: 24 Page: 3 Filed: 03/12/2024
WRIGHT v. MCDONOUGH 3
action on his alleged April 2019 CUE motion because he
failed to show unreasonable delay under the factors artic-
ulated in Telecommunications Research and Action Center
v. Federal Communications Commission, 750 F.2d 70 (D.C.
Cir. 1984) (TRAC), id. at *9–11.
Mr. Wright appeals the Veterans Court’s decision. He
“is solely appealing the [Veterans Court’s] opinion regard-
ing the [CUE] related to his [SMC] benefits as a matter of
law and the Appellee’s unreasonable delay in processing
[his] CUE claim.” Appellant’s Br. at 1.
DISCUSSION
Our jurisdiction to review decisions of the Veterans
Court is limited by statute. See 38 U.S.C. § 7292. We may
review “the validity of a decision of the Court on a rule of
law or of any statute or regulation . . . or any interpretation
thereof . . . that was relied on by the Court in making the
decision.” 38 U.S.C. § 7292(a). We have “jurisdiction to re-
view the [Veterans Court’s] decision whether to grant a
mandamus petition that raises a non-frivolous legal ques-
tion.” Beasley v. Shinseki, 709 F.3d 1154, 1158 (Fed. Cir.
2013). Although we “may not review the factual merits of
the veteran’s claim,” “we may determine whether the peti-
tioner has satisfied the legal standard for issuing the writ.”
Id. We review the Veterans Court’s denial of a petition for
a writ of mandamus for abuse of discretion. See Lamb v.
Principi, 284 F.3d 1378, 1384 (Fed. Cir. 2002); Kerr v. U.S.
Dist. Ct. for N. Dist. of Cal., 426 U.S. 394, 403 (1976).
To obtain mandamus, the petitioner must show (1) that
there are no adequate alternative legal channels through
which the petitioner may obtain the requested relief,
(2) that he has a clear and indisputable legal right to that
relief, and (3) that the grant of mandamus relief is appro-
priate under the circumstances. See Cheney v. U.S. Dist.
Ct. for D.C., 542 U.S. 367, 380–81 (2004); Hargrove v.
Shinseki, 629 F.3d 1377, 1378 (Fed. Cir. 2011).
Case: 23-2200 Document: 24 Page: 4 Filed: 03/12/2024
4 WRIGHT v. MCDONOUGH
For the SMC-benefits claim, the Veterans Court found
the writ to be inappropriate because “Mr. Wright has not
shown that he lacks alternative means to pursue relief.”
Order, 2023 WL 4175143, at *2; see also id. at *7. The
proper course of action, in the Veterans Court’s view, would
be for Mr. Wright to appeal through the Regional Office as
a “request for a writ is not a substitute for the claims and
appeals process.” Id. at *6–7. Because Mr. Wright did not
exhaust his administrative remedies, the Veterans Court
did not abuse its discretion in dismissing the petition for a
writ of mandamus. See Hargrove, 629 F.3d at 1378.
Nor did the Veterans Court abuse its discretion in
denying the petition based on its finding that Mr. Wright
had not shown unreasonable delay on his alleged April
2019 CUE motion. When analyzing petitions based on al-
leged unreasonable delay by the VA, the Veterans Court is
guided by the six TRAC factors:
(1) the time agencies take to make decisions must
be governed by a “rule of reason”;
(2) where Congress has provided a timetable or
other indication of the speed with which it expects
the agency to proceed in the enabling statute, that
statutory scheme may supply content for this rule
of reason;
(3) delays that might be reasonable in the sphere of
economic regulation are less tolerable when human
health and welfare are at stake;
(4) the court should consider the effect of expedit-
ing delayed action on agency activities of a higher
or competing priority;
(5) the court should also take into account the na-
ture and extent of the interests prejudiced by delay;
and
Case: 23-2200 Document: 24 Page: 5 Filed: 03/12/2024
WRIGHT v. MCDONOUGH 5
(6) the court need not find “any impropriety lurking
behind agency lassitude” in order to hold that
agency action is unreasonably delayed.
Martin v. O’Rourke, 891 F.3d 1338, 1344–45, 1348 (Fed.
Cir. 2018) (quoting TRAC, 750 F.2d at 79–80).
Here, the Veterans Court concluded that Mr. Wright
failed to show unreasonable delay under the TRAC factors
because his only pending CUE motion was filed in January
2023. Order, 2023 WL 4175143, at *10.
Mr. Wright argues that the TRAC factors favor him.
See Appellant’s Br. 22–29. The gist of his argument is that
even though he did not file a CUE motion until January
2023, he called one of the VA’s call centers as early as April
2019 and thus alerted the VA of a CUE by that date. So
according to Mr. Wright, April 2019 is the relevant starting
point, and a five-year delay is unreasonable.
The Veterans Court, however, found no record of a
pending CUE claim prior to January 2023 and explained
that VA regulations dictate how Mr. Wright should have
proceeded in order to adjudicate a CUE motion that he be-
lieved to be pending. Order, 2023 WL 4175143, at *6–7.
Mr. Wright provides no legal authority for his argument
that calling the VA amounts to the filing of a CUE motion.
The Veterans Court therefore acted within its discretion in
finding that January 2023 was the relevant date from
which to measure the reasonableness of any delay and that
there was not an unreasonable delay.
Mr. Wright also raises various arguments character-
ized as constitutional. However, an “appellant’s ‘character-
ization of [a] question as constitutional in nature does not
confer upon us jurisdiction that we otherwise lack.’” Flores
v. Nicholson, 476 F.3d 1379, 1382 (Fed. Cir. 2007) (quoting
Helfer v. West, 174 F.3d 1332, 1335 (Fed. Cir. 1999)).
Mr. Wright’s allegedly constitutional arguments appear to
Case: 23-2200 Document: 24 Page: 6 Filed: 03/12/2024
6 WRIGHT v. MCDONOUGH
simply reargue the merits of his case, issues over which we
do not have jurisdiction. See id.
CONCLUSION
We have considered Mr. Wright’s remaining argu-
ments and find them unpersuasive. We affirm the Veter-
ans Court’s order as to the writ of mandamus and dismiss
those issues over which we lack jurisdiction.
AFFIRMED-IN-PART AND DISMISSED-IN-PART
COSTS
No costs.