Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-15-05200/USCOURTS-caDC-15-05200-0/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 890
Nature of Suit: Other Statutory Actions
Cause of Action: 

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United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued May 13, 2016 Decided July 15, 2016

No. 15-5200

DAVID PATCHAK,

APPELLANT

v.

SALLY JEWELL, IN HER OFFICIAL CAPACITY AS SECRETARY OF 

THE UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR, ET AL.,

APPELLEES

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the District of Columbia

(No. 1:08-cv-01331)

Sharon Y. Eubanks argued the cause and filed the briefs 

for Appellant. 

Lane N. McFadden, Attorney, U.S. Department of 

Justice, argued the cause for federal Appellees. With him on 

the brief was John C. Cruden, Assistant Attorney General.

Nicole E. Ducheneaux and Conly J. Schulte were on the 

brief for intervenor Defendant-Appellees 

Match-E-Be-Nash-She-Wish Band of Pottawatomi Indians.

Before: ROGERS, PILLARD and WILKINS, Circuit Judges.

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Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge WILKINS.

WILKINS, Circuit Judge: David Patchak brought this suit 

under the Administrative Procedure Act, 5 U.S.C. §§ 702, 

705, challenging the authority of the Department of the 

Interior to take title to a particular tract of land under the 

Indian Reorganization Act (IRA), 25 U.S.C. § 465. The land, 

called the Bradley Property, had been put into trust for the use 

of the Match-E-Be-Nash-She-Wish Band of Pottawatomi 

Indians in Michigan, otherwise known as the Gun Lake Band 

or the Gun Lake Tribe. 

Following the Supreme Court’s determination in 2012 

that Mr. Patchak had prudential standing to bring this lawsuit, 

see Match-E-Be-Nash-She-Wish Band of Pottawatomi Indians 

v. Patchak, 132 S. Ct. 2199, 2212 (2012), Congress passed the 

Gun Lake Trust Land Reaffirmation Act (the Gun Lake Act), 

Pub. L. No. 113-179, 128 Stat. 1913 (2014), a stand-alone 

statute reaffirming the Department of the Interior’s decision to 

take the land in question into trust for the Gun Lake Tribe,

and removing jurisdiction from the federal courts over any 

actions relating to that property. Taking into account this new 

legal landscape, the District Court determined on summary 

judgment that it was stripped of its jurisdiction to consider 

Mr. Patchak’s claim. Holding additionally that the Act was 

not constitutionally infirm, as Mr. Patchak contended, the 

District Court dismissed the case. 

Mr. Patchak now appeals the dismissal of his suit, as well 

as a collateral decision regarding the District Court’s denial of 

a motion to strike a supplement to the administrative record. 

For the reasons stated below, we affirm the District Court’s 

determination that the Gun Lake Act is constitutionally sound

and, accordingly, that Mr. Patchak’s suit must be dismissed. 

We further conclude that the District Court did not abuse its 

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discretion by denying Mr. Patchak’s motion to strike a 

supplement to the administrative record.

I.

The Match-E-Be-Nash-She-Wish Band of Pottawatomi 

Indians (the Gun Lake Tribe) is an Indian tribe whose 

members descend from a band of Pottawatomi Indians, led by 

Chief Match-E-Be-Nash-She-Wish, who occupied present day 

western Michigan. See Proposed Findings for 

Acknowledgement of the Match-e-be-nash-she-wish Band of 

Pottawatomi Indians of Michigan, 62 Fed. Reg. 38113, 38113

(July 16, 1997). While the Tribe had been a party to many 

treaties with the United States government in the 18th and 

19th centuries, it only began pursuing federal 

acknowledgement under the modern regulatory regime of the 

Bureau of Indian Affairs, 25 C.F.R. §§ 83.1-83.46, in 1992. 

The Tribe was formally recognized by the Department of the 

Interior in 1999. In 2001, the Tribe petitioned for a tract of 

land in Wayland Township, Michigan – called the Bradley 

Property – to be put into trust under the IRA. The Tribe 

sought to use the land to construct and operate a gaming and 

entertainment facility. The Bureau of Indian Affairs approved 

the petition in 2005, placing the Bradley Property into trust 

for the Tribe’s use. See Notice of Determination, 70 Fed. 

Reg. 25596, 25596 (May 13, 2005). The Gun Lake Casino

opened on February 10, 2011. 

David Patchak lives in a rural area of Wayland Township 

commonly referred to as Shelbyville, in close proximity to the 

Bradley Property. Mr. Patchak asserts that he moved to the 

area because of its unique rural setting, and that he values the 

quiet life afforded him there. Mr. Patchak filed the present

lawsuit against the Secretary of the Interior and the Assistant 

Secretary of the Interior for the Bureau of Indian Affairs on 

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August 1, 2008, invoking the court’s jurisdiction under the 

Administrative Procedure Act (APA), 5 U.S.C. §§ 702, 705. 

Mr. Patchak claimed that he would be injured by the 

construction and operation of a casino in his community

because it would, among other things, irreversibly change the 

rural character of the area, increase traffic and pollution, and 

divert local resources away from existing residents. Mr. 

Patchak argued that because the Tribe was not formally 

recognized when the IRA was enacted in June 1934, the 

Secretary lacked the authority to put the Bradley Property into

trust for the Gun Lake Tribe.1 The Gun Lake Tribe 

intervened as a defendant.

In response to Mr. Patchak’s complaint, the United States 

and the Tribe claimed that Mr. Patchak lacked prudential 

standing because his interest in the Bradley Property was 

“fundamentally at odds with the purpose of the IRA” and he 

therefore did not fall within the IRA’s “zone of interests.” 

Patchak v. Salazar, 646 F. Supp. 2d 72, 76 (D.D.C. 2009). 

The District Court agreed, and dismissed the complaint for 

lack of subject matter jurisdiction. Id. at 76, 79. Patchak 

appealed to this Court, and we reversed. See Patchak v. 

Salazar, 632 F.3d 702 (D.C. Cir. 2011). The Supreme Court 

agreed, holding that Patchak did indeed have prudential 

standing to bring his suit. See Match-E-Be-Nash-She-Wish 

Band of Pottawatomi Indians, 132 S. Ct. at 2212. The case 

was remanded to the District Court for further proceedings. 

 1 Mr. Patchak’s arguments on the merits of his claim rely heavily 

on the Supreme Court’s decision in Carcieri v. Salazar, 555 U.S. 

379 (2009), published after he initially filed his lawsuit. Carcieri 

interpreted part of the recognition provision of the IRA, 25 U.S.C. 

§ 479. 555 U.S. at 387-93. Because we do not reach the merits of 

Mr. Patchak’s claim in this appeal, we do not consider the impact of 

Carcieri in this case.

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In the time between the Supreme Court’s prudential 

standing determination and the parties’ renewed attention to 

the case, both the Department of the Interior and Congress 

weighed in further on the legal status of the Gun Lake Tribe 

and the Bradley Property, respectively. First, the Department 

of the Interior issued an Amended Notice of Decision 

approving an application the Tribe had submitted for two 

other parcels of land it sought to acquire. As part of this 

Notice of Decision, the Secretary expressly considered, and 

confirmed, its authority to take land into trust for the benefit 

of the Gun Lake Tribe. Second, on September 26, 2014, 

President Obama signed the Gun Lake Act into law. The 

substantive text of the Gun Lake Act is as follows: 

(a) IN GENERAL.—The land taken into trust by the 

United States for the benefit of the Match–E–Be–

Nash–She–Wish Band of Pottawatomi Indians and 

described in the final Notice of Determination of the 

Department of the Interior (70 Fed. Reg. 25596 (May 

13, 2005)) is reaffirmed as trust land, and the actions 

of the Secretary of the Interior in taking that land into 

trust are ratified and confirmed.

(b) NO CLAIMS.—Notwithstanding any other 

provision of law, an action (including an action 

pending in a Federal court as of the date of enactment 

of this Act) relating to the land described in 

subsection (a) shall not be filed or maintained in a 

Federal court and shall be promptly dismissed.

(c) RETENTION OF FUTURE RIGHTS.—Nothing 

in this Act alters or diminishes the right of the Match–

E–Be–Nash–She–Wish Band of Pottawatomi Indians 

from seeking to have any additional land taken into

trust by the United States for the benefit of the Band.

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Gun Lake Act § 2. 

Shortly following the enactment of the Gun Lake Act, the 

parties filed motions for summary judgment. The District 

Court determined that, as a result of this legislation, it was 

now stripped of jurisdiction to consider Mr. Patchak’s claim. 

See Patchak v. Jewell, 109 F. Supp. 3d 152, 159 (D.D.C. 

2015). Rejecting Mr. Patchak’s constitutional challenges to 

the Gun Lake Act, the District Court granted summary 

judgment in favor of the Government and the Tribe, and 

dismissed the case. Id. at 160-65. The District Court also 

denied Mr. Patchak’s Motion to Strike the Administrative 

Record Supplement, which had challenged the addition of the 

Amended Notice of Decision to the record before the court. 

See Order, Patchak v. Jewell, Civil Action No. 08-1331 

(RJL), Docket No. 93 (D.D.C. June 17, 2015). Mr. Patchak 

now appeals those decisions. 

II.

The language of the Gun Lake Act makes plain that 

Congress has stripped federal courts of subject matter 

jurisdiction to consider the merits of Mr. Patchak’s complaint, 

which undisputedly “relat[es] to the land described” in 

Section 2(a) of the Act. Gun Lake Act § 2(b). Accordingly, 

Patchak’s suit “shall not be . . . maintained . . . and shall be 

promptly dismissed.” Id. Of course, this is only so if the Gun 

Lake Act is not otherwise constitutionally infirm, as “a 

statute’s use of the language of jurisdiction cannot operate as 

a talisman that ipso facto sweeps aside every possible 

constitutional objection.” Nat’l Coal. to Save Our Mall v. 

Norton, 269 F.3d 1092, 1096 (D.C. Cir. 2001) (citing 

RICHARD H. FALLON, JR., ET AL., HART AND WECHSLER’S THE 

FEDERAL COURTS AND THE FEDERAL SYSTEM 368 (4th ed. 

1996)). The federal courts have “presumptive jurisdiction . . .

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to inquire into the constitutionality of a jurisdiction-stripping 

statute.” Belbacha v. Bush, 520 F.3d 452, 456 (D.C. Cir. 

2008). 

Mr. Patchak’s constitutional challenges to the Gun Lake 

Act are pure questions of law that we review de novo. See, 

e.g., Eldred v. Reno, 239 F.3d 372, 374 (D.C. Cir. 2001). 

A.

Mr. Patchak first argues that the Gun Lake Act 

encroaches upon the Article III judicial power of the courts to 

decide cases and controversies, in violation of wellestablished constitutional principles of the separation of 

powers. Article III imbues in the Judiciary “the ‘province and 

duty . . . to say what the law is’ in particular cases and 

controversies.” Bank Markazi v. Peterson, 136 S. Ct. 1310, 

1322 (2016) (quoting Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. (1 Cranch)

137, 177 (1803)). This endowment of authority necessarily 

“blocks Congress from ‘requir[ing] federal courts to exercise 

the judicial power in a manner that Article III forbids.’” Id. at 

1322-23 (quoting Plaut v. Spendthrift Farm, Inc., 514 U.S. 

211, 218 (1995)). 

Congress is generally free to direct district courts to apply 

newly enacted legislation in pending civil cases. See Bank 

Markazi, 136 S. Ct. at 1325. Without question, “a statute 

does not impinge on judicial power when it directs courts to 

apply a new legal standard to undisputed facts.” Id. This rule 

is no different when the newly enacted legislation in question 

removes the judiciary’s authority to review a particular case

or class of cases. See Nat’l Coal. to Save Our Mall, 269 F.3d 

at 1096. It is well settled that “Congress has the power 

(within limits) to tell the courts what classes of cases they 

may decide.” City of Arlington v. FCC, 133 S. Ct. 1863, 1868 

(2013). Congress may not, however, “prescribe or 

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superintend how [courts] decide those cases.” Id. at 1869.

Congress impermissibly encroaches upon the judiciary when 

it “prescribe[s] rules of decision” for a pending case. United 

States v. Klein, 80 U.S. (13 Wall.) 128, 146 (1871). In short, 

Congress may not direct the result of pending litigation unless 

it does so by “supply[ing] new law.” Robertson v. Seattle 

Audubon Soc., 503 U.S. 429, 439 (1992). Mr. Patchak argues 

that the Gun Lake Act did not provide any new legal standard 

to apply, but rather impermissibly directed the result of his 

lawsuit under pre-existing law. 

These principles do not require, as Mr. Patchak suggests, 

that in order to affect pending litigation, Congress must 

directly amend the substantive laws upon which the suit is 

based. Indeed, Supreme Court precedent belies such a 

contention. 

In Seattle Audubon, for example, the Supreme Court 

considered the impact of new legislation on pending cases 

challenging the federal government’s efforts to allow the 

harvesting and sale of old-growth timber in the Pacific 

Northwest. 503 U.S. at 431. The legislation was the 

Northwest Timber Compromise, a provision of the 

Department of the Interior and Related Agencies 

Appropriations Act, 1990, Pub. L. No. 101-121, § 318, 103 

Stat. 745 (1989). Id. at 433. It established rules to govern the 

forest harvesting at issue in the pending consolidated cases, 

and spoke expressly to those suits – even identifying them by 

caption number. Id. at 433-35. If loggers complied with the 

new rules, Congress posited, they would thereby satisfy the 

statutory obligations on which the pending environmental 

litigation rested. Id. The Ninth Circuit held that the 

Northwest Timber Compromise unconstitutionally dictated 

the outcome of pending litigation without amending the 

underlying laws, but the Supreme Court disagreed. The Court 

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held that the legislation effectively “replaced the legal 

standards underlying the two original challenges . . . without 

directing particular applications under either the old or the 

new standards.” Id. at 436-37. Because the provision 

“compelled changes in law,” id. at 438, the Court concluded 

that the provision “affected the adjudication of the 

[specifically identified] cases . . . by effectively modifying the 

provisions at issue in those cases,” id. at 440. 

The Supreme Court’s recent Bank Markazi decision 

likewise applied new legislation to pending litigation. That 

legislation did not directly amend or modify the particular 

statute upon which the pending litigation was based. Section 

502 of the Iran Threat Reduction and Syria Human Rights Act 

of 2012, Pub. L. No. 112-158, § 502, 126 Stat. 1214, 1258, 22 

U.S.C. § 8772 (2012) had been passed in order “[t]o place 

beyond dispute” the availability of certain assets for 

satisfaction of judgments rendered in certain specifically

identified terrorism cases. Bank Markazi, 136 S. Ct. at 1318. 

The statute was enacted as a freestanding measure, not as an 

amendment to the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976 

(FSIA) (which allows American nationals to file suit against 

state sponsors of terrorism in United States courts, see 28 

U.S.C. § 1605A), or the Terrorism Risk Insurance Act of 

2002 (TRIA) (which authorizes execution of judgments 

obtained under the FSIA’s terrorism exception against “the 

blocked assets of [a] terrorist party”). Id. Rejecting a 

challenge similar to the one Mr. Patchak pursues here – that 

the provision “did not simply amend pre-existing law,” id. at 

1325 – the Court held that “§ 8772 changed the law by 

establishing new substantive standards,” id. at 1326. As the 

Court explained, “§ 8772 provides a new standard clarifying 

that, if Iran owns certain assets, the victims of Iran-sponsored 

terrorist attacks will be permitted to execute against those 

assets.” Id.

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Our decision in National Coalition to Save Our Mall is 

also instructive. There, we considered a separation-of-powers 

challenge to a statute that withdrew from the federal courts 

subject matter jurisdiction to review challenges to specific 

executive decisions relating to the placement of the World 

War II Memorial on the National Mall. 269 F.3d at 1096-97. 

In rejecting that challenge, we emphasized that there is no 

“prohibition against Congress’s changing the rule of decision 

in a pending case, or (more narrowly) changing the rule to 

assure a pro-government outcome.” Id. at 1096. And while 

this Court “express[ed] no view” on the question whether a 

court could do so without amending the substantive law on 

which a pending claim rested, we did note that the provision 

at issue (Public Law No. 107-11) “present[ed] no more 

difficulty than the statute upheld in [Seattle Audubon], as 

Public Law No. 107-11 similarly amend[ed] the applicable 

substantive law.” 269 F.3d at 1097. 

Consistent with those decisions, we conclude that the 

Gun Lake Act has amended the substantive law applicable to 

Mr. Patchak’s claims. That it did so without directly 

amending or modifying the APA or the IRA is no matter. 

Through its ratification and confirmation of the Department of 

the Interior’s decision to take the Bradley Property into trust, 

expressed in Section 2(a), and its clear withdrawal of subject 

matter jurisdiction in Section 2(b), the Gun Lake Act has 

“changed the law.” Bank Markazi, 136 S. Ct. at 1326. More 

to the point, Section 2(b) provides a new legal standard we are 

obliged to apply: if an action relates to the Bradley Property, 

it must promptly be dismissed. Mr. Patchak’s suit is just such 

an action. 

That this change has only affected Mr. Patchak’s lawsuit 

does not change our analysis here, for Congress is not limited 

to enacting generally applicable legislation. Particularized 

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legislative action is not unconstitutional on that basis alone. 

See Bank Markazi, 136 S. Ct. at 1327-28; Plaut, 514 U.S. at 

239 n.9; Nat’l Coal. to Save Our Mall, 269 F.3d at 1097. 

“Even laws that impose a duty or liability upon a single 

individual or firm are not on that account invalid . . . .” Plaut, 

514 U.S. at 239 n.9. 

In passing the Gun Lake Act, Congress exercised its 

“broad general powers to legislate in respect to Indian tribes, 

powers that [the Supreme Court] ha[s] consistently described 

as ‘plenary and exclusive.’” United States v. Lara, 541 U.S. 

193, 200 (2004). Accordingly, we ought to defer to the policy 

judgment reflected therein. Such is our role. Indeed, 

“[a]pplying laws implementing Congress’ policy judgments, 

with fidelity to those judgments, is commonplace for the 

Judiciary.” Bank Markazi, 136 S. Ct. at 1326. 

B.

Mr. Patchak next asserts that the Gun Lake Act burdens 

his First Amendment right to petition. See U.S. CONST.

amend. I (“Congress shall make no law . . . abridging . . . the 

right of the people . . . to petition the Government for a 

redress of grievances.”). The Petition Clause “protects the 

right of individuals to appeal to courts and other forums 

established by the government for resolution of legal 

disputes.” Borough of Duryea v. Guarnieri, 564 U.S. 379, 

387 (2011).

The right of access to courts is, without question, “an 

aspect of the First Amendment right to petition the

government.” Id. (quoting Sure-Tan, Inc. v. NLRB, 467 U.S. 

883, 896-97 (1984)); see also Cal. Motor Transp. Co. v. 

Trucking Unltd., 404 U.S. 508, 513 (1972). It is an important 

right, see Bill Johnson’s Rests., Inc. v. NLRB, 461 U.S. 731, 

741 (1983), but it is not absolute, see McDonald v. Smith, 472 

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U.S. 479, 484 (1985). For example, an individual does not 

have a First Amendment right of access to courts in order to 

pursue frivolous litigation. Id. More to the point, the right to 

access federal courts is subject to Congress’s Article III 

power to define and limit the jurisdiction of the inferior courts 

of the United States. See U.S. CONST. art. III, § 1; cf. Lauf v. 

E.G. Shinner & Co., 303 U.S. 323, 330 (1938); Ameur v. 

Gates, 759 F.3d 317, 326 (4th Cir. 2014). Congress may

withhold jurisdiction from inferior federal courts “in the exact 

degrees and character which to Congress may seem proper for 

the public good.” Palmore v. United States, 411 U.S. 389, 

401 (1973) (quoting Cary v. Curtis, 44 U.S. (3 How.) 236, 

245 (1845)). 

Moreover, the Gun Lake Act does not foreclose Mr. 

Patchak’s right to petition the government in all forums; it 

affects only his ability to do so via federal courts. And while 

he argues that other forms of petition – such as seeking 

redress directly from the agency – would be futile, Patchak

concedes that he is not entitled to a successful outcome in his 

petition, or even for the government to listen or respond to his 

complaints. Rightfully so. “Nothing in the First Amendment 

or in [the Supreme] Court’s case law interpreting it suggests 

that the rights to speak, associate, and petition require 

government policymakers to listen or respond to individuals’ 

communications on public issues.” Minn. State Bd. for Cmty. 

Colls. v. Knight, 465 U.S. 271, 285 (1984); see also We the 

People Found., Inc. v. United States, 485 F.3d 140, 141 (D.C. 

Cir. 2007).

By stripping federal courts of subject matter jurisdiction 

over challenges to the status of the Bradley Property, 

Congress has made its determination as to what is “proper for 

the public good.” Palmore, 411 U.S. at 401 (quoting Cary, 44 

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U.S. (3 How.) at 245). There is no constitutional infirmity 

here.

C.

Mr. Patchak also claims that the Gun Lake Act implicates 

his rights under the Fifth Amendment’s Due Process Clause. 

The Fifth Amendment instructs that the federal government 

may not deprive individuals of property “without due process 

of law.” U.S. CONST. amend. V. In order to determine 

whether there has been a violation of due process rights, we 

undertake a two-part inquiry: first, we must determine 

whether the claimant was deprived of a protected interest; and 

second, if the claimant was so deprived, we then consider

what process the claimant was due. Logan v. Zimmerman 

Brush Co., 455 U.S. 422, 428 (1982); Ralls Corp. v. Comm. 

on Foreign Inv. in U.S., 758 F.3d 296, 315 (D.C. Cir. 2014). 

Mr. Patchak identifies a potentially protected property 

interest in his unadjudicated claim. The Supreme Court has

“affirmatively settled” that a cause of action is a species of 

property requiring due process protection. Logan, 455 U.S. at 

428 (analyzing due process rights under the Fourteenth 

Amendment) (citing Mullane v. Cent. Hanover Bank & Trust 

Co., 339 U.S. 306 (1950)). Surely so, as “[t]he hallmark of 

property . . . is an individual entitlement grounded in state 

law, which cannot be removed except ‘for cause.’” Id. at 430

(quoting Memphis Light, Gas & Water Div. v. Craft, 436 U.S. 

1, 11-12 (1978)). Once the legislature confers an interest by 

statute, it may not constitutionally authorize the deprivation of 

that interest without implementing appropriate procedural 

safeguards. Id. at 432. 

But even assuming that there may be a property right to 

pursue a cause of action, in a challenge to legislation affecting 

that very suit, the legislative process provides all the process 

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that is due. As discussed above, the legislature has the power 

to change the underlying laws applicable to a case while it is 

pending and, as a result, to alter the outcome of that case. See 

Nat’l Coal. to Save Our Mall, 269 F.3d at 1096; see also 

United States v. Schooner Peggy, 5 U.S. (1 Cranch) 103, 110

(1801) (where “a law intervenes and positively changes the 

rule which governs, the law must be obeyed”). 

In Logan, the Supreme Court acknowledged that “[o]f 

course,” a legislature “remains free to create substantive 

defenses or immunities for use in adjudication—or to 

eliminate its statutorily-created causes of action altogether—

just as it can amend or terminate” benefits programs it has put 

into place. 455 U.S. at 432; cf. PruneYard Shopping Ctr. v. 

Robins, 447 U.S. 74, 92 (1980) (Marshall, J., concurring) 

(“[T]he Due Process Clause does not forbid the ‘creation of 

new rights, or the abolition of old ones recognized by the 

common law, to attain a permissible legislative object.’” 

(quoting Silver v. Silver, 280 U.S. 117, 122 (1929))). Indeed,

“[n]o person has a vested interest in any rule of law, entitling 

him to insist that it shall remain unchanged for his benefit.” 

N.Y. Cent. R.R. Co. v. White, 243 U.S. 188, 198 (1917). 

Accordingly, while a cause of action may be a “species of 

property” that is afforded due process protection, Logan, 455 

U.S. at 428, there is no deprivation of property without due 

process when legislation changes a previously existing and 

still-pending cause of action, id. at 432. In such a 

circumstance, “the legislative determination provides all the 

process that is due.” 455 U.S. at 433. 

We have no reason to except the Gun Lake Act from this 

general approach. Congress made a considered determination 

to ratify the Department of the Interior’s decision to take the 

Bradley Property into trust for the Gun Lake Tribe, and 

further to remove any potential impediments to the finality of 

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that decision. It did not violate Mr. Patchak’s due process 

rights by doing so. 

D.

Mr. Patchak’s final constitutional challenge to the Gun 

Lake Act is that it constitutes an impermissible Bill of 

Attainder. See U.S. CONST. art. I, § 9, cl. 3. Under this 

provision, Congress may not “enact[] ‘a law that legislatively

determines guilt and inflicts punishment upon an identifiable 

individual without provision of the protections of a judicial 

trial.’” Foretich v. United States, 351 F.3d 1198, 1216 (D.C. 

Cir. 2003) (quoting Nixon v. Adm’r of Gen. Servs., 433 U.S. 

425, 468 (1977)). A law is prohibited under the Bill of 

Attainder Clause if two elements are met: (1) the statute

applies with specificity; and (2) the statute imposes 

punishment. Id. at 1217. We are able to resolve Mr. 

Patchak’s challenge on the second element alone, because the 

Gun Lake Act is not punitive. 

In order to decide whether a statute impermissibly inflicts 

punishment, we consider each case in “its own highly 

particularized context.” Selective Serv. Sys. v. Minn. Pub. 

Interest Research Grp., 468 U.S. 841, 852 (1984) (quoting 

Flemming v. Nestor, 363 U.S. 603, 616 (1960)). In so doing, 

we pursue a three-part inquiry: 

(1) whether the challenged statute falls within the 

historical meaning of legislative punishment; 

(2) whether the statute, ‘viewed in terms of the type 

and severity of burdens imposed, reasonably can be 

said to further nonpunitive legislative purposes’; and 

(3) whether the legislative record ‘evinces a 

congressional intent to punish.’ 

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Id. (quoting Nixon, 433 U.S. at 475-76, 478). These factors 

are considered independently, and are weighed together to 

resolve a bill of attainder claim. See Foretich, 351 F.3d at 

1218. None of the three factors is necessarily dispositive, but 

this Court has noted that the second factor – what is called the 

“functional test” – “invariably appears to be the most 

important of the three.” Id. (quoting BellSouth Corp. v. FCC, 

162 F.3d 678, 684 (D.C. Cir. 1998)).

Historically, laws invalidated as bills of attainder 

“offer[ed] a ready checklist of deprivations and disabilities so 

disproportionately severe and so inappropriate to nonpunitive 

ends that they unquestionably have been held to fall within 

the proscription of [Article] I, § 9.” Nixon, 433 U.S. at 473. 

“This checklist includes sentences of death, bills of pains and 

penalties, and legislative bars to participation in specified 

employments or professions.” Foretich, 351 F.3d at 1218. 

Jurisdictional limitations are generally not of this type. See

Ameur, 759 F.3d at 329 (“[J]urisdictional limits are usually 

not viewed as traditional ‘punishment.’”); Hamad v. Gates,

732 F.3d 990, 1004 (9th Cir. 2013) (“Jurisdictional limitations 

. . . do not fall within the historical meaning of legislative 

punishment.”); see also Scheerer v. U.S. Att’y Gen., 513 F.3d 

1244, 1253 n.9 (11th Cir. 2008) (declining to find that a 

“generally applicable jurisdictional rule” amounted to a bill of 

attainder in part because it “d[id] not impose punishment of 

any kind”); Nagac v. Derwinski, 933 F.2d 990, 991 (Fed. Cir.

1991) (jurisdictional limitation “d[id] not impose a 

punishment ‘traditionally adjudged to be prohibited by the 

Bill of Attainder Clause’” (quoting Nixon, 433 U.S. at 475)). 

The second prong of the inquiry, the “functional test,”

requires that the legislation have “a legitimate nonpunitive 

purpose” and that there is “a rational connection between the 

burden imposed and [the] nonpunitive purposes.” Foretich, 

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351 F.3d at 1220-21. In other words, the means employed by 

the statute must be rationally designed to meet its legitimate 

nonpunitive goals. 

The Gun Lake Act passes this test. The Gun Lake Act 

serves the legitimate nonpunitive purpose of “provid[ing] 

certainty to the legal status of the [Bradley Property], on 

which the Tribe has begun gaming operations as a means of 

economic development for its community.” S. REP. NO. 113-

194, at 2 (2014). Congress accomplished this goal by 

affirming and ratifying the Department of the Interior’s initial 

decision to put the land into trust for the Tribe in Section 2(a), 

but also by removing jurisdiction over matters relating to the

land in Section 2(b). In point of fact, Congress’s intended 

goal of providing certainty with respect to the trust land

would have been impossible to achieve absent the termination 

of any outstanding litigation – specifically, Mr. Patchak’s suit. 

The legislative history reflects an acknowledgement of this 

fact, noting that Mr. Patchak’s suit “places in jeopardy the 

Tribe’s only tract of land held in trust and the economic 

development project that the Tribe is currently operating on 

the land.” Id. Whatever burden is imposed by Section 2(b), 

on Mr. Patchak or otherwise, the statute is rationally designed 

to meet its legitimate, nonpunitive purpose of providing 

certainty with respect to the trust land. 

Finally, the legislative record does not evince a 

congressional intent to punish. Mr. Patchak has presented no 

evidence, other than the acknowledgement that his case would 

be affected, for his claim that Congress purposefully targeted 

him for retaliation through the Gun Lake Act. While it may 

be true that Mr. Patchak was adversely affected as a result of 

the legislation, the record does not show that Congress acted

with any punitive or retaliatory intent. 

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E.

The Government suggests that there is an alternative 

ground on which we could rule, arguing that the Gun Lake 

Act provides an exemption to the APA’s waiver of sovereign 

immunity. While the Government did not make this argument

in the proceedings below, sovereign immunity is a threshold 

jurisdictional question that speaks to the court’s authority to 

hear a given case, and so we would be well within bounds to 

consider the question. See FDIC v. Meyer, 510 U.S. 471, 475 

(1994). “Indeed, the ‘terms of the United States’ consent to 

be sued in any court define that court’s jurisdiction to 

entertain the suit.” Id. (quoting United States v. Sherwood, 

312 U.S. 584, 586 (1941)). Nevertheless, because we 

conclude that the Gun Lake Act is not constitutionally infirm, 

and that subject matter jurisdiction over Mr. Patchak’s claim 

has thus validly been withdrawn, we need not consider the 

matter further.

III.

In a separate challenge to the proceedings below, Mr. 

Patchak contends that the District Court erred by permitting 

the administrative record to be supplemented. We review the 

District Court’s denial of Mr. Patchak’s Motion to Strike the 

Administrative Record Supplement for abuse of discretion. 

Cf. Am. Wildlands v. Kempthorne, 530 F.3d 991, 1002 (D.C. 

Cir. 2008).

Although this case may not present circumstances 

typically permitting the agency to supplement the record, see 

id., the District Court’s failure to strike the supplemental 

information provided to it was not an abuse of discretion. The

District Court denied Mr. Patchak’s Motion to Strike 

Supplemental Record “[f]or the reasons set forth in the 

Memorandum Opinion” entered on the same date, see Order,

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Patchak v. Jewell, Civil Action No. 08-1331 (RJL), Docket 

No. 93 (D.D.C. June 17, 2015) – i.e., the District Court’s 

determination, at issue in this appeal, that it was without

jurisdiction to consider the suit and that the case was to be 

dismissed in its entirety, Patchak v. Jewell, 109 F. Supp. 3d 

152 (D.D.C. 2015). The District Court only mentioned the

record supplement in the Procedural Background section of its 

opinion in order to indicate the “events [that] have altered the 

legal landscape” in the time since the case was remanded 

from the Supreme Court. Id. at 158. The District Court did 

not abuse its discretion by referencing that development in 

this way. Nor did it abuse its discretion by denying a motion 

to strike a supplement to the record at the same time that it 

was dismissing the case in its entirety for lack of jurisdiction. 

IV.

For the foregoing reasons, the District Court’s decisions 

below are affirmed.

So ordered.

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