1. Whether this Court's contemporaneous-evidence requirement from Lee v. United States, 582 U.S. 357 (2017), applies only to accepted-plea cases and is therefore inapplicable to rejected-plea ineffective-assistance claims governed by Lafler v. Cooper, 566 U.S. 156 (2012), and Missouri v. Frye, 566 U.S. 134 (2012).

2. Whether the Fourth Circuit violated the Sixth Amendment and the Certificate-of-Appealability standard in Buck v. Davis, 580 U.S. 100 (2017), by denying a COA despite (a) factual disputes requiring an evidentiary hearing, (b) evidence supporting deficient performance and prejudice under Strickland, Lafler, and Frye, and (c) a ruling conflicting with United States v. Brown, No. 22-7105 (4th Cir. May 20, 2025), and the sister-circuit precedents relied on in Brown, creating a Rule 10(a) conflict.

Whether the Fourth Circuit's denial of a Certificate of Appealability in a rejected-plea ineffective-assistance case violated the Sixth Amendment by failing to apply the proper legal standard under Lafler v. Cooper and Missouri v. Frye, and whether Lee v. United States's contemporaneous-evidence requirement applies only to accepted-plea cases