Willie Williams v. Douglas A. Collins, Secretary of Veterans Affairs

N OTE: This disposition is nonprecedential.
United States Court of Appeals
for the Federal Circuit
______________________
WILLIE WILLIAMS,
Claimant-Appellant
v.
DOUGLAS A. COLLINS, SECRETARY OF
VETERANS AFFAIRS,
Respondent-Appellee
______________________
2025-1914
______________________
Appeal from the United States Court of Appeals for
Veterans Claims in No. 24-1493, Judge Joseph L. Falvey,
Jr.
______________________
Decided: December 2, 2025
______________________
WILLIE WILLIAMS , Greenville, TX, pro se.
BRENDAN D AVID J ORDAN, Commercial Litigation
Branch, Civil Division, United States Department of Jus-
tice, Washington, DC, for respondent-appellee. Also repre-
sented by ERIC P. BRUSKIN, P ATRICIA M. M C CARTHY , BRETT
SHUMATE.
______________________
Case: 25-1914 Document: 13 Page: 1 Filed: 12/02/2025

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WILLIAMS v. COLLINS 2
Before T ARANTO, BRYSON, and CUNNINGHAM , Circuit
Judges.
P ER CURIAM .
Appellant Willie Williams seeks review of the decision
of the United States Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims
(“the Veterans Court”) that denied his challenge to a deci-
sion granting service connection for a disability only as of
May 1998. We dismiss the appeal for lack of jurisdiction.
I
Mr. Williams served on active duty in the U.S. Army
between June 1963 and October 1970. In November 2013,
a regional office of the Department of Veterans Affairs
(“VA”) granted him service connection for a right ankle
strain with degenerative joint disease. The regional office
assigned him a 0% rating effective March 25, 2002, and a
10% rating effective May 10, 2004.
In March 2023, the Board of Veterans’ Appeals altered
his disability rating by granting him a right ankle disabil-
ity rating of 20%, effective March 25, 2002. The Board at
that time remanded the case to the regional office with in-
structions to prepare a Statement of the Case regarding
whether Mr. Williams was entitled to an effective date ear-
lier than March 25, 2002, for service connection for his
right ankle disability.
On remand, the regional office denied an earlier effec-
tive date, and Mr. Williams appealed that decision to the
Board. On August 2, 2023, the Board granted him an ef-
fective date of May 12, 1998, for his disability claim. App.
9.
Dissatisfied with that decision, Mr. Williams, proceed-
ing pro se, appealed the Board’s August 2, 2023, decision to
the Veterans Court. In a single-judge decision, the Veter-
ans Court affirmed the Board’s decision. The court noted
that although Mr. Williams seemed to be raising several
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WILLIAMS v. COLLINS 3
issues on appeal, the only issue before the court in the ap-
peal from the Board’s August 2, 2023, decision was whether
the Board was correct in finding that there was no “com-
munication from him to VA before May 1998 requesting
service connection for a right ankle strain,” and therefore
Mr. Williams “ha[d] not met his burden of showing any er-
ror in the August 2023 Board decision on appeal.” App. 4.
Mr. Williams filed a motion seeking reconsideration of
the single-judge decision and in the alternative requesting
a panel decision. App. 6. The motion for reconsideration
by the single judge was denied, and the motion for a panel
decision was granted. Id. The panel then determined that
the single-judge memorandum decision had not “over-
looked or misunderstood a fact or point of law prejudicial
to the outcome of the appeal.” Id. The court also ruled that
there was not “any conflict with precedential decisions of
the Court” and that the appeal did not “otherwise raise[]
an issue warranting a precedential decision.” Id. Conclud-
ing that Mr. Williams had not presented any argument
warranting consideration by the panel, the court ruled that
the single-judge decision would remain the decision of the
court. Id. at 6–7. Mr. Williams sought review by the en
banc Veterans Court, which was denied. App. 8.
Mr. Williams then filed an appeal with this court.
II
The government argues that this court lacks jurisdic-
tion over Mr. Williams’s appeal. We agree.
By statute, this court has jurisdiction over appeals
from a decision of the Veterans Court “with respect to the
validity of a decision of the Court on a rule of law or of any
statute or regulation (other than a refusal to review the
schedule of ratings for disabilities adopted under section
1155 of [title 38]) or any interpretation thereof (other than
a determination as to a factual matter) that was relied on
by the Court in making the decision.” 38 U.S.C. § 7292(a).
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WILLIAMS v. COLLINS 4
The statute adds that this court “shall have exclusive juris-
diction to review and decide any challenge to the validity of
any statute or regulation or any interpretation thereof
brought under this section, and to interpret constitutional
and statutory provisions, to the extent presented and nec-
essary to a decision,” 38 U.S.C. § 7292(c); that the court
“shall decide all relevant questions of law, including inter-
preting constitutional and statutory provisions,” id.,
§ 7292(d)(1); and that except to the extent that an appeal
presents a constitutional issue, the court “may not review
(A) a challenge to a factual determination, or (B) a chal-
lenge to a law or regulation as applied to the facts of a par-
ticular case,” id., § 7292(d)(2).
In his opening and reply briefs, Mr. Williams alludes to
a number of issues, none of which raise questions that fall
within this court’s jurisdiction.
A
In his opening brief on appeal, Mr. Williams focuses on
the Veterans Court’s failure to grant en banc review of his
claim, which he claims violated Rule 35(c) of the Rules of
the Veterans Court. That rule provides as follows:
(c) Motion for Full Court Review. Motions for full
Court review are not favored. Ordinarily they will
not be granted unless such action is necessary to
secure or maintain uniformity of the Court’s deci-
sions or to resolve a question of exceptional im-
portance. Subject to the requirements of
subsections (d), (e), and (f), a party may move for a
decision by the full Court—
(1) after a panel has decided a case, or
(2) after a panel has denied a motion for re-
consideration or granted a motion for a de-
cision by a panel but held that the single-
judge decision remains the decision of the
Court.
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WILLIAMS v. COLLINS 5
Rule 35(c), Rules of the Court of Appeals for Veterans
Claims.
Mr. Williams’s argument regarding the Veterans
Court’s denial of his request for en banc review presents a
pure question of the application of law to fact and is there-
fore outside this court’s jurisdiction. Although Mr. Wil-
liams asserts in passing that the failure to grant full court
review of his claim constitutes “invidious discrimination”
and denial of his “constitutional right to a fair hearing,”
Appellant’s Opening Br. at 2–3, those claims are entirely
undeveloped and are constitutional in name only. As such,
they do not call on this court to “interpret[] constitutional
. . . provisions,” 38 U.S.C. § 7292(d)(1), and thus do not fall
within the provisions of section 7292 that give this court
jurisdiction over claims that require this court to interpret
constitutional or statutory provisions, see Arnesen v. Prin-
cipi, 300 F.3d 1353, 1360 (Fed. Cir. 2002) (the denial of a
request for full Veterans Court review does not itself vio-
late due process).
In Flores v. Nicholson, 476 F.3d 1379, 1382 (Fed. Cir.
2007), this court explained that merely characterizing a
claim as constitutional in nature does not confer upon this
court jurisdiction that we otherwise lack. As the court
stated, “[t]he appellant’s argument . . . appears to be aimed
at the merits of her claim and does not raise a separate
constitutional issue. Therefore, this court has no jurisdic-
tion to consider this issue.” Id.; see also Helfer v. West, 174
F.3d 1332, 1335 (Fed. Cir. 1999) (claim that is constitu-
tional in name only does not confer jurisdiction on this
court; the appellant’s “characterization of [a] question as
constitutional in nature does not confer upon us jurisdic-
tion that we otherwise lack”).
B
In his reply brief, Mr. Williams makes broader claims
than in his opening brief. In addition to continuing to con-
tend that the court erred by failing to grant en banc review,
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WILLIAMS v. COLLINS 6
Appellant’s Reply Br. at 4–6, Mr. Williams appears to be
challenging the Board’s August 2, 2023, decision for failing
to address other aspects of his overall challenge to the
agency’s failure to grant greater relief to him on his overall
claim relating to his ankle disability, claims that were only
hinted at in his opening brief. See Appellant’s Opening Br.
at 2.
As the Veterans Court explained, however, the only de-
cision before it on appeal was the Board’s August 2, 2023,
decision that found (in Mr. Williams’s favor) that May 12,
1998, was the effective date for his service-connection
claim. App. 4. Accordingly, the new issues raised in Mr.
Williams’s reply brief are not properly before us because
they were not raised in his opening brief. In any event, the
new claims raised in his reply brief are not within the scope
of his appeal. Those issues were not addressed by the
Board (and thus were not addressed by the Veterans
Court), because the remand proceeding that was before the
Board in the proceeding leading to the Board’s August 2,
2023, decision was limited to the effective date of service
connection for Mr. Williams’s claim.
The Veterans Court’s decision did not turn on the va-
lidity of that court’s interpretation of a rule of law or its
interpretation of any statute or regulation. Instead, the
court’s decision turned at most on a challenge to a law or
regulation as applied to the facts of a particular case. For
that reason, this appeal does not fall within our jurisdiction
to review decisions of the Veterans Court. The appeal
therefore must be dismissed.
No costs.
DISMISSED
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