[00:00:01] Speaker 03:
Good morning.

[00:00:02] Speaker 03:
We're back on the record.

[00:00:05] Speaker 03:
And we have one matter where both parties are appearing remotely.

[00:00:09] Speaker 03:
And on that matter, each side has 10 minutes.

[00:00:15] Speaker 03:
And if you are the appellant, that 10 minutes includes any time you wish to reserve for rebuttal.

[00:00:23] Speaker 03:
And we're calling Tony D. Hornsby versus Frank Bisignano.

[00:00:30] Speaker 03:
Case number 24-54-22.

[00:00:31] Speaker 03:
All right, we're ready to hear from the appellant.

[00:00:39] Speaker 01:
Thank you.

[00:00:40] Speaker 01:
May it please the court?

[00:00:42] Speaker 01:
My name is Etan Kaslianich, and I'm representing Tony Hornsby in this appeal.

[00:00:47] Speaker 01:
I would like to reserve three minutes of my time for rebuttal.

[00:00:53] Speaker 01:
Mr. Hornsby has been unable to work successfully for a long time.

[00:01:00] Speaker 01:
He was in the military until 1988 when he had basically a

[00:01:08] Speaker 01:
a break, a mental health break that resulted in being discharged from the military.

[00:01:14] Speaker 01:
Over the course of the next 14, 15 years, he went to school, he tried to work, he had limited success, kind of even lose a lot of jobs.

[00:01:26] Speaker 01:
but he kept trying.

[00:01:29] Speaker 01:
By 2004, he was no longer able to hold down work and he had applied for disability benefits from the VA and was granted them.

[00:01:43] Speaker 01:
He was found to be 100% disabled from his mental health impairments.

[00:01:53] Speaker 01:
They found him that he was found disabled by them in December of 2004, but they found that his actual disability went back to July of 2004.

[00:02:06] Speaker 01:
He's not had any substantial gainful activity since then.

[00:02:10] Speaker 01:
His earnings record shows no earnings.

[00:02:14] Speaker 01:
There are references in the file to various attempts to be a defense contractor.

[00:02:23] Speaker 01:
The nature of his mental health impairment, as is discussed in his mental health evaluations, does result in him saying things that aren't always... Well, Mr. Yanich, let me go back.

[00:02:37] Speaker 03:
You and I have had arguments before previously, and I think I've mentioned to you that

[00:02:48] Speaker 03:
that just summarizing the evidence without really doing any analysis isn't that helpful.

[00:02:56] Speaker 03:
The district court explained that you spent several pages of your brief below simply summarizing parts of the medical record before asserting the evidence is essentially uncontradicted and the ALJ erred.

[00:03:09] Speaker 03:
Much of your brief before us does the same thing.

[00:03:11] Speaker 03:
Doesn't this, without more simply, invite us to review the same evidence that the ALJ reviewed and second-guess the ALJ's factual findings?

[00:03:23] Speaker 03:
You always make us do so much work.

[00:03:26] Speaker 01:
Well, Your Honor, in this case, there are only three medical opinions.

[00:03:33] Speaker 01:
The timeframe we're looking at here is from 2004 to 2009, December 2009.

[00:03:38] Speaker 01:
That's when he has to establish disability.

[00:03:42] Speaker 01:
During that time period, there are three psychological evaluations.

[00:03:47] Speaker 01:
One is in 2010, actually, but it's not too long after 2009.

[00:03:51] Speaker 01:
Those three psychological evaluations, all three evaluators concluded that he was disabled.

[00:03:56] Speaker 01:
That is the evidence and record that supports his claim.

[00:04:07] Speaker 01:
I discussed one of those evaluations.

[00:04:10] Speaker 01:
Two of them had clear opinions about his functional limitations.

[00:04:15] Speaker 01:
The third one just basically said he's got so many problems he can't work.

[00:04:20] Speaker 01:
But there were many findings in that report that support the other two evaluations.

[00:04:25] Speaker 01:
The three evaluations are all consistent.

[00:04:27] Speaker 01:
That's the record.

[00:04:28] Speaker 01:
That's the evidence.

[00:04:30] Speaker 02:
The record isn't limited to that.

[00:04:33] Speaker 01:
Oh, it's not.

[00:04:34] Speaker 01:
The time period that we're looking at, it is.

[00:04:38] Speaker 02:
So one of the problems we have is that the judge, the ALJ, didn't consider some opinions because they're outside of that period that we're talking about, I think 2004 to 2009, and did consider other opinions that were outside the period.

[00:04:56] Speaker 02:
There's an inconsistency there.

[00:04:57] Speaker 02:
I'm concerned about that.

[00:04:59] Speaker 02:
Do you think I misread that record?

[00:05:03] Speaker 01:
When he was evaluating the medical opinions, a section of his opinion where his decision, when he evaluates medical opinions, he discusses Dr. Schomburg's opinion, Dr. Price's opinion.

[00:05:17] Speaker 01:
Those are the only two that he discusses.

[00:05:20] Speaker 01:
And Dr. Price was in the relevant time period.

[00:05:24] Speaker 01:
Dr. Schomburg was only four months or five months later, I believe.

[00:05:28] Speaker 01:
And his opinion, I think, relates back because it's consistent with Dr. Price's opinion from the relevant period.

[00:05:34] Speaker 01:
Dr. Tyler is the third psychologist and hers was in the early end of the period.

[00:05:39] Speaker 02:
I think we're not communicating.

[00:05:43] Speaker 01:
Okay.

[00:05:44] Speaker 01:
I hear you.

[00:05:45] Speaker 01:
I hear you.

[00:05:45] Speaker 01:
You're saying that he rejected some evidence outside the period and accepted other evidence, but he didn't really technically accept other medical opinions outside the period because he basically said, he even looked at the state agency's opinions and he said, well, no, they're not even opinions.

[00:06:04] Speaker 01:
They had no opinions, so those don't count.

[00:06:06] Speaker 01:
So when I look at what opinions there are in the record,

[00:06:09] Speaker 01:
that relate to the relevant period, I see these three opinions, all three of which support a finding of disability, I don't see any medical evidence from the relevant time period that doesn't.

[00:06:23] Speaker 00:
There were providers that your client saw outside the relevant period, correct?

[00:06:33] Speaker 00:
They weren't providers of psychiatric or psychological care, but your client did see providers outside the relevant period, correct?

[00:06:43] Speaker 00:
Yes, he did.

[00:06:44] Speaker 00:
And the IJ relied on statements made to those providers or perhaps even conclusions made by those providers, correct?

[00:06:55] Speaker 01:
Yes.

[00:06:56] Speaker 03:
Yeah, your client made many statements to physical health treatment providers over the years.

[00:07:01] Speaker 03:
yet appears to have never made complaints about schizophrenia, depression, and other psychiatric symptoms.

[00:07:08] Speaker 03:
Why is that not sufficient for the ALJ to reject your client's testimony as inconsistent with objective medical evidence?

[00:07:18] Speaker 01:
My client is very, very doctor phobic.

[00:07:21] Speaker 01:
He was removed from the military based on a medical diagnosis which he never accepted and to this day he knows that's his label and he's demonstrated the symptoms of it and that's why every psychologist that evaluated and concluded

[00:07:41] Speaker 01:
that he had these diagnoses, but part of his diagnosis is he does not, he will not go to mental health providers.

[00:07:51] Speaker 01:
He will not take the medications he didn't take and he'd been prescribed medications while he was psychiatrically hospitalized.

[00:07:57] Speaker 01:
He refuses to take those.

[00:07:59] Speaker 01:
And so he lives an isolated life.

[00:08:01] Speaker 01:
That's how he has coped with his impairments.

[00:08:04] Speaker 02:
Isn't the more salient point in response to, and this is really for both counsel to just kind of boil it down.

[00:08:10] Speaker 02:
I appreciate that he lives alone.

[00:08:12] Speaker 02:
We don't have a spouse or a friend or just the one telephonic friend as we often have to describe how this person interacts.

[00:08:20] Speaker 02:
So we have a really limited record and this individual to go to Judge Callahan's point from day one

[00:08:26] Speaker 02:
He has showed very poor insight into his condition.

[00:08:30] Speaker 02:
He's denied several times even having any psychological condition, even though we know he was hospitalized for several months.

[00:08:36] Speaker 02:
And he has a very heavy duty diagnosis of a schizo, different variations of the umbrella diagnosis.

[00:08:45] Speaker 02:
So it's really tough.

[00:08:47] Speaker 02:
And of course, it is your client's burden.

[00:08:52] Speaker 02:
I don't put a lot of stock in the fact that this individual has denied the diagnosis or not made complaints because that's been true from day one, including at the time he was

[00:09:04] Speaker 02:
declared by the military to be 100% disabled because he has schizophrenia.

[00:09:09] Speaker 02:
But I think what all three of my colleagues have mentioned is there is other evidence in the record.

[00:09:15] Speaker 02:
It's just sporadic, right?

[00:09:17] Speaker 02:
It's what he happened to tell a dentist, or it's what he happened to tell somebody when he went in to see a different type of a care provider for a different condition.

[00:09:24] Speaker 02:
And I just want to be clear, you're not suggesting that we shouldn't consider, or the ALJ couldn't consider that evidence, are you?

[00:09:32] Speaker 01:
No, no.

[00:09:33] Speaker 01:
Other evidence is always relevant.

[00:09:35] Speaker 01:
It's challenging here when you've got this period from 2004 to 2009 that has to prove disability during that timeframe.

[00:09:43] Speaker 01:
Generally speaking, you want to be able to grab evidence that's from that timeframe and there is three psychological evaluations that are close enough in there.

[00:09:52] Speaker 01:
I mean, for example, 1988, 1990, that's why he was removed from the military.

[00:10:00] Speaker 01:
It's very important.

[00:10:02] Speaker 01:
It's in the file.

[00:10:03] Speaker 01:
It's important evidence of the history, and then he worked after that on and off, and he had trouble with it, and then he hasn't since.

[00:10:11] Speaker 01:
So yes, can you consider it?

[00:10:14] Speaker 01:
Yes.

[00:10:15] Speaker 01:
The problem, I guess, is that the judge, from my perspective, is that the judge rejected the three psychological opinions that are from the relevant time period.

[00:10:24] Speaker 01:
And he didn't point any contradictory evidence from that time period and certainly not any evaluations because there weren't any.

[00:10:32] Speaker 01:
Every person who's evaluated him has come to the same conclusion.

[00:10:35] Speaker 03:
I'm sort of shocked here that you're requesting we remand for an award of benefits when it was your burden to prove this in the first place.

[00:10:45] Speaker 03:
So if you are lucky enough to get a remand to get benefits, you know, but even if we were to credit as true all the evidence the ALJ rejected,

[00:10:57] Speaker 03:
Don't we still need to have further findings from the ALJ regarding how the evidence weighs against the other evidence in the record?

[00:11:05] Speaker 03:
I find it very surprising that if you were fortunate enough to get a remand that you would think that it would be for an award of benefits when really there have to be other developments in the record.

[00:11:23] Speaker 01:
I can't strongly disagree with you on that.

[00:11:26] Speaker 03:
I put that in there because if you don't... You shouldn't put things in if you can't disagree.

[00:11:30] Speaker 03:
We take it at face value.

[00:11:34] Speaker 03:
You should only make arguments that you think you can prove.

[00:11:38] Speaker 03:
I know I'm being a little hard on you, but you're hard on me by not doing a better brief.

[00:11:48] Speaker 01:
Your honor, if the court accepts the three psychological opinions from that time period, those opinions all support a finding of disability.

[00:11:58] Speaker 01:
However, there is other evidence that the court might see, and it's often true that

[00:12:04] Speaker 01:
It would be nice if an ALJ actually fairly weighed all this stuff, and the ALJ's reasons, my point is, when the ALJ gives reasons that aren't any good, the court does have within its discretion the ability to credit the rejected evidence and award it benefits, but it's within the discretion of the court.

[00:12:21] Speaker 01:
And in the discretion of the court, you believe that that is not appropriate relief here, then I can't argue with it.

[00:12:30] Speaker 01:
It's within your discretion.

[00:12:32] Speaker 01:
But I believe that there is no evidence here to support.

[00:12:36] Speaker 01:
Substantial evidence even does not support the ALJ's reasons for rejecting this.

[00:12:41] Speaker 03:
All right, your time.

[00:12:41] Speaker 03:
We've taken you over time.

[00:12:43] Speaker 03:
Unless my colleagues have further questions, we'll move to hear from the government.

[00:12:47] Speaker 03:
And I'll give you one minute for rebuttal.

[00:12:49] Speaker 03:
Thank you.

[00:12:50] Speaker 03:
Do you have any further questions?

[00:12:51] Speaker 03:
No, I don't.

[00:12:52] Speaker 03:
OK.

[00:12:54] Speaker 03:
We'll hear from the government.

[00:12:56] Speaker 04:
Good morning, Your Honors.

[00:12:57] Speaker 04:
May it please the court?

[00:12:59] Speaker 04:
Lindsay Payne on behalf of the Commissioner of Social Security.

[00:13:03] Speaker 04:
The record as a whole here shows that throughout the time period from 2004 through 2009, when Kleeman asserts he was disabled due to his mental impairments, that as the court discussed, he was not engaged in mental health treatment.

[00:13:18] Speaker 04:
But the important part is that while not engaged in mental health treatment, his treatment notes showed consistently that he was behaving normally, without complaints, and able to carry on normal activities of daily living.

[00:13:33] Speaker 03:
Well, but he doesn't.

[00:13:36] Speaker 03:
On face value, his statements regarding his employment history, education level, travel, and more each, they seem false on their face.

[00:13:46] Speaker 03:
And they're not verified anywhere in the records.

[00:13:49] Speaker 03:
So why would it be reasonable for the ALJ to have taken them at face value?

[00:13:53] Speaker 03:
I mean, it's sort of like at what point?

[00:13:56] Speaker 03:
I mean, he almost like says he's Superman.

[00:13:59] Speaker 03:
I mean, he's doing international travel.

[00:14:02] Speaker 03:
He went to law school.

[00:14:04] Speaker 03:
He did this.

[00:14:04] Speaker 03:
He did that.

[00:14:06] Speaker 03:
It doesn't seem to be at all true.

[00:14:11] Speaker 03:
Two points on that.

[00:14:12] Speaker 04:
One, both Dr. Price and Dr. Schomburg, who were Veterans Affairs psychologists who evaluated claimant, found that he was not delusional.

[00:14:26] Speaker 04:
It was not what?

[00:14:27] Speaker 03:
I'm sorry.

[00:14:28] Speaker 04:
That he was not delusional.

[00:14:30] Speaker 04:
So he might be prone to grandiosity, but they found that he did not actually believe on true things to be happening.

[00:14:40] Speaker 04:
Second, I would disagree that as a whole, all of these statements on their face are false.

[00:14:49] Speaker 04:
So the travel, for example, comes into play because claimant went to a Veterans Affairs hospital seeking vaccinations that would be needed for certain international travel.

[00:15:04] Speaker 04:
And by all accounts,

[00:15:07] Speaker 04:
we're not sure how, but he was financially supporting himself with the aid of his VA benefits throughout this time to the extent that he was a homeowner.

[00:15:19] Speaker 04:
Going to receive vaccinations for international travel is the type of organized logistical activity that on its face doesn't necessarily seem

[00:15:32] Speaker 02:
to be false.

[00:15:45] Speaker 02:
anything other than that he showed up to get some vaccinations.

[00:15:48] Speaker 02:
I mean, he also reported that he was a military defense contractor.

[00:15:52] Speaker 02:
And the Social Security, the ALJ, you know, acknowledged that there is really no indication in the record, and of course, Social Security have access to his earnings records, that that ever happened, right?

[00:16:04] Speaker 02:
The same thing is true of law school.

[00:16:05] Speaker 02:
My concern in this case is that

[00:16:08] Speaker 02:
is very typical for a claim to be denied because someone's testimony is not consistent with what they're capable of actually doing.

[00:16:16] Speaker 02:
And in this case, we don't have any other folks around him, really, to be very persuasive about what he was capable of actually doing.

[00:16:24] Speaker 02:
We have his own self-reports.

[00:16:25] Speaker 02:
We know that his care providers, who are psychologists, psychiatrists, consistently said that he engages in grandiosity and has very poor insight.

[00:16:35] Speaker 02:
the ALJ here cited these particular inconsistencies.

[00:16:39] Speaker 02:
I think there's three of them that should have been objectively verifiable, whether he went to law school or has his graduate degree, which should be objectively verifiable.

[00:16:48] Speaker 02:
And the same is true of whether he served as a defense contractor and whether he engaged in this international travel.

[00:16:56] Speaker 02:
There is a duty to develop the record.

[00:16:58] Speaker 02:
So by relying on those particular facts to discredit his testimony, it struck me as

[00:17:05] Speaker 02:
not enough.

[00:17:07] Speaker 02:
What's your best response to that?

[00:17:10] Speaker 04:
A couple points.

[00:17:11] Speaker 04:
So,

[00:17:12] Speaker 04:
Just to clarify, some of those allegations were that those were things he wanted to do.

[00:17:18] Speaker 04:
There was one reference to being a defense contractor, which the ALJ recited in the decision, but didn't necessarily use on its own to discredit his testimony.

[00:17:32] Speaker 04:
The law school was a statement that he wanted to go to law school.

[00:17:36] Speaker 04:
He made similar statements about wanting to serve in the FBI, for example.

[00:17:40] Speaker 02:
He also stated that he has a graduate degree.

[00:17:44] Speaker 02:
He stated he has a graduate degree.

[00:17:45] Speaker 02:
Another place he said it took forever to get the AA degree, but also said he has a graduate degree.

[00:17:51] Speaker 04:
Which is then balanced against the fact that he is making a lot of inconsistent statements.

[00:17:55] Speaker 04:
But more importantly, what we do have is the

[00:17:59] Speaker 04:
the record evidence that your honors pointed to from his treatment records that he's actually engaging in really organized behavior by staying on top of his physical treatment and he's behaving normally and interacting normally with these providers.

[00:18:16] Speaker 04:
They're not relying on his statements that everything is okay.

[00:18:20] Speaker 04:
They're observing him, including

[00:18:23] Speaker 04:
Obviously, this is not a psychologist or a psychiatrist, but there's a lot of dental records.

[00:18:28] Speaker 04:
We've all been to the dentist.

[00:18:30] Speaker 04:
You're having procedures.

[00:18:31] Speaker 04:
You're there for a fair amount of time.

[00:18:35] Speaker 04:
And he's behaving really normally.

[00:18:37] Speaker 02:
So that's consistent with what we see in these types of cases with mental illness, where the patient will wax and wane.

[00:18:43] Speaker 02:
And we have some snippets, some occasions in the record where he seems to be acting normally, at least to the extent that he can get himself to a dentist appointment

[00:18:51] Speaker 02:
or get himself to some of these other care providers on occasion.

[00:18:55] Speaker 02:
The other part of the record seems to be that he's washed out of 30 different jobs and he's not capable of sustaining employment.

[00:19:01] Speaker 02:
So it seems to me to be just a very difficult record to say that I've got any confidence in that.

[00:19:10] Speaker 04:
And that's where

[00:19:11] Speaker 04:
One, as Your Honors noted, the burden comes in, right?

[00:19:15] Speaker 04:
That it was Klayman's burden to establish his limitations.

[00:19:19] Speaker 04:
But also really important here, the ALJ did not find that Klayman is not mentally impaired.

[00:19:27] Speaker 04:
The ALJ found that he did have a significant mental disorder and assessed limitations.

[00:19:35] Speaker 04:
And if we look at the specifics of

[00:19:37] Speaker 04:
the psychological evaluations that he did have through the Veterans Affairs, their opinions, one, there's the opinion of whether he's disabled under Veterans Affairs standards, which is irrelevant to whether he is disabled under SSAC.

[00:19:57] Speaker 00:
It's not irrelevant.

[00:19:58] Speaker 00:
It's not determinative.

[00:19:59] Speaker 00:
It's not binding.

[00:20:01] Speaker 00:
It's certainly relevant evidence.

[00:20:03] Speaker 04:
It's not determinative.

[00:20:05] Speaker 04:
The rating is not something the ALJ needs to articulate consideration of.

[00:20:12] Speaker 04:
Certainly, the ALJ needs to consider their assessments of him, and that's highly relevant.

[00:20:19] Speaker 04:
But if we look at the details, they're not wildly out of step with the residual functional capacity assessed here.

[00:20:28] Speaker 04:
Dr. Price found

[00:20:30] Speaker 04:
seems to have difficulty comprehending directions, may have difficulty following the requirements of day-to-day performance, and has demonstrated limited resourcefulness in dealing with problems.

[00:20:42] Speaker 04:
But she also specifically found at page 392 of the record that claimant was not totally occupationally impaired.

[00:20:51] Speaker 04:
Yes.

[00:20:52] Speaker 00:
You mentioned Dr. Price.

[00:20:54] Speaker 00:
And I want to ask you a question about the ALJ's treatment of the reports of Dr. Schomburg.

[00:21:01] Speaker 00:
Schomburg, I guess, and Dr. Price.

[00:21:03] Speaker 00:
In part, the ALJ said, I'm discounting them because the examinations occurred outside the relevant claimed disability period.

[00:21:14] Speaker 00:
But the ALJ also relied on reports by providers who were not psychiatric or psychological providers who also saw

[00:21:26] Speaker 00:
the claimant outside the relevant period.

[00:21:29] Speaker 00:
So I'm trying to figure out why you can reject some because they're outside the relevant period, but credit others.

[00:21:37] Speaker 00:
And there may be a good reason, but the ALG never explained why.

[00:21:40] Speaker 00:
Can you address that?

[00:21:43] Speaker 04:
Sure.

[00:21:43] Speaker 04:
And let me clarify.

[00:21:45] Speaker 04:
So as Mr. Janich stated, there were three Veterans Affairs evaluations, the first being Dr. Tyler,

[00:21:54] Speaker 04:
I don't think there's any dispute that what Dr. Tyler issued in his report is not a medical opinion.

[00:22:02] Speaker 04:
The ALJ considered Dr. Tyler's findings, but there was no opinion to consider.

[00:22:08] Speaker 04:
Then we have Dr. Price.

[00:22:11] Speaker 04:
Dr. Price issued her assessment during the relevant time period.

[00:22:16] Speaker 04:
The ALJ did not discount it based on when it was issued.

[00:22:21] Speaker 04:
Then we have Dr. Schomburg.

[00:22:23] Speaker 04:
Dr. Schomburg's report is from five months after the period under review.

[00:22:28] Speaker 04:
The ALJ did consider that it's from outside of the period under review and did not claim to be retrospective, but that certainly wasn't the only reason that the ALJ gave.

[00:22:42] Speaker 04:
It would be one thing if the ALJ said, I'm not going to consider Dr. Schomburg's opinion because it's from after the period under review.

[00:22:49] Speaker 04:
That's not what he said.

[00:22:50] Speaker 04:
He said it was a one-time examination.

[00:22:53] Speaker 04:
without access to the full longitudinal record.

[00:22:58] Speaker 04:
It occurred after the expiration of the insurance status.

[00:23:02] Speaker 04:
It wasn't supported by his own examination findings.

[00:23:06] Speaker 04:
including that Dr. Stromberg specifically found that he was not delusional and was not hallucinating, and also that it was based in part on reports from claimant that weren't consistent with the rest of the record.

[00:23:20] Speaker 04:
The ALJ also found it wasn't consistent with the lack of mental health treatment and with the denial of mental health symptoms.

[00:23:29] Speaker 04:
And then

[00:23:32] Speaker 04:
But the ALJ is otherwise generally considering treatment records that are from within the relevant time period, as far as observations about his behavior.

[00:23:47] Speaker 00:
Well, the ALJ did credit statements made to providers outside the relevant claim period, correct?

[00:23:58] Speaker 04:
Yes.

[00:23:59] Speaker 04:
I did consider, for example, the travel, I believe, was after.

[00:24:03] Speaker 00:
And the ALJ also credited medical opinions by people who only saw Hornsby once, correct?

[00:24:17] Speaker 04:
Credited medical opinions.

[00:24:19] Speaker 00:
Non-psychiatric providers who only saw him once.

[00:24:23] Speaker 00:
In other words, one of the criticisms of Schomburg was that he only saw him once.

[00:24:28] Speaker 00:
There were other people who only saw him once, and the ALJ nonetheless relied on their impressions, correct?

[00:24:37] Speaker 04:
Yes, I agree.

[00:24:38] Speaker 04:
Relyed in part on their impressions or observations, but I would differentiate between those statements and medical opinions, which

[00:24:51] Speaker 04:
have a very specific definition under social security regulations, meaning what the claimant can still do despite his impairment.

[00:24:59] Speaker 00:
One final question.

[00:25:00] Speaker 00:
What medical opinion, I understand it's the burden of the claimant to prove his case, but what medical opinion do you believe supports the ALJ's denial of benefits?

[00:25:16] Speaker 04:
Ultimately, I am certainly bound by the ALJ's own statement that he didn't credit any one.

[00:25:26] Speaker 00:
That's not the question I asked.

[00:25:27] Speaker 00:
I asked if you had a point to a medical opinion that said that the claimant was not disabled during the relevant period, could you point to one?

[00:25:44] Speaker 00:
Normally there's an in-house opinion by someone who's examined the claimant and said, you know, I don't think he's disabled.

[00:25:53] Speaker 00:
I don't see that in this case, and that's why I'm asking.

[00:25:57] Speaker 04:
Yes.

[00:25:57] Speaker 04:
And despite the fact that the ALJ found the two VA opinions not persuasive, I would point to Dr. Price's statement that claimant is not totally occupationally impaired.

[00:26:12] Speaker 04:
page 392 of the record, and I would also point to Dr. Schomburg's statement at page 1108 of the record, which states, the best description of claimant's current psychiatric impairment is psychiatric symptoms cause occupational and social impairment with occasional decrease in work efficiency and intermittent inability to perform occupational tasks, although generally the person is functioning satisfactorily

[00:26:40] Speaker 04:
with routine behavior, self-care, and normal conversation.

[00:26:44] Speaker 03:
So while... Did that take into consideration that he had been fired from 30 jobs?

[00:26:51] Speaker 04:
That took into consideration, yes, Dr. Schomburg received Claimant's allegations, which is borne out by the record that certainly he has had lapses in employment.

[00:27:07] Speaker 04:
But one point on that, there's no evidence that Claimant has tried unskilled work of the type

[00:27:14] Speaker 04:
that the ALJ relied on here.

[00:27:16] Speaker 04:
He had, for example, been working as an assistant superintendent in the construction industry where he was inspecting the work of skilled tradespeople.

[00:27:27] Speaker 03:
So... We've taken... Go ahead.

[00:27:29] Speaker 03:
No, forgive me.

[00:27:30] Speaker 03:
We've taken you way over your time.

[00:27:32] Speaker 03:
So, that'll... Well, unless my colleagues want to ask a... Which you're free to.

[00:27:37] Speaker 03:
Yeah, I'm fine.

[00:27:37] Speaker 03:
Okay.

[00:27:38] Speaker 03:
There are no additional questions.

[00:27:39] Speaker 03:
Just one minute for rebuttal.

[00:27:41] Speaker 03:
Mr. Yanich.

[00:27:43] Speaker 03:
Thank you.

[00:27:46] Speaker 01:
First of all, I want to just point to one of some of the best evidence in this file is the evidence from Ruth Martin, even though much of her contact with

[00:28:03] Speaker 01:
Her contact with Hornsby was over the phone.

[00:28:06] Speaker 01:
She has a longitudinal description of symptoms that is consistent with the psychologist's opinions.

[00:28:16] Speaker 01:
Second, I wanted to just point out that the travel evidence is all from 2015 to 2019, and it is.

[00:28:22] Speaker 01:
It's contradictory.

[00:28:24] Speaker 01:
It is what it is, as much of his testimony is.

[00:28:29] Speaker 03:
Well, wouldn't that be part of your burden, too?

[00:28:32] Speaker 03:
You should have probably presented that he didn't make any of those travels.

[00:28:38] Speaker 03:
If it's your burden.

[00:28:41] Speaker 01:
Well, first of all, even assuming... I mean, it's sort of hard to prove a negative.

[00:28:48] Speaker 01:
So to prove that... Even assuming that he made some of those travels,

[00:28:57] Speaker 01:
They were between 2015 and 2019.

[00:28:59] Speaker 01:
And I don't know that I can get how I would get proof of him crossing borders, for example.

[00:29:11] Speaker 01:
There's this fantastic kind of description of activities that it just doesn't add up.

[00:29:20] Speaker 01:
And that was something that, once again, was pointed out by every psychologist who he talked to.

[00:29:25] Speaker 01:
The only final thing I wanted to mention is just the fact that he could get to the dentist and could interact with them.

[00:29:33] Speaker 01:
And actually the quote that my opposing counsel mentioned from Dr. Schomburg's report is very, it is important.

[00:29:40] Speaker 01:
His psychiatric symptoms cause occupational and social impairment with occasional decrease in work efficiency, intermittent inability to perform tasks.

[00:29:50] Speaker 01:
And those kind of limitations were not accepted by the ALJ or included in his residual functional capacity.

[00:29:57] Speaker 01:
And those are the kind of limitations that would cause you to lose jobs.

[00:30:01] Speaker 03:
All right.

[00:30:01] Speaker 03:
Thank you both for your argument.

[00:30:03] Speaker 03:
This matter will stand submitted.

[00:30:11] Speaker 03:
Court is in recess until tomorrow.

[00:30:15] Speaker 03:
All rise.

[00:30:36] Speaker 04:
The court stands in recess until tomorrow morning at 9.