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2 

MELLOULI v. LYNCH 

Syllabus 

removal  under  successive  versions  of  what 

gers 
is  now 
§1227(a)(2)(B)(i).    Matter  of  Paulus,  11  I.  &  N.  Dec.  274,  is  illustra-
tive.    At  the  time  the  BIA  decided  Paulus,  California  controlled  cer-
tain “narcotics” not listed as “narcotic drugs” under federal law.  Id., 
at  275.    The  BIA  concluded  that  an  alien’s  California  conviction  for 
offering  to  sell  an  unidentified  “narcotic”  was  not  a  deportable  of-
fense,  for  it  was  possible  that  the  conviction  involved  a  substance 
controlled only under California, not federal, law.  Under the Paulus 
analysis, Mellouli would not be deportable.  The state law involved in 
Mellouli’s  conviction,  like  the  California  statute  in  Paulus,  was  not 
confined to federally controlled substances; it also included substanc-
es controlled only under state, not federal, law. 

The BIA, however, announced and applied a different approach to
drug-paraphernalia  offenses  (as  distinguished  from  drug  possession 
and distribution offenses) in Matter of Martinez Espinoza, 25 I. & N. 
Dec. 118.  There, the BIA ranked paraphernalia statutes as relating
to “the drug trade in general,” reasoning that a paraphernalia convic-
tion  “relates  to”  any  and  all  controlled  substances,  whether  or  not
federally  listed,  with  which  the  paraphernalia  can  be  used.    Id.,  at 
120–121.    Under  this  reasoning,  there  is  no  need  to  show  that  the 
type of controlled substance involved in a paraphernalia conviction is 
one defined in §802.

The  BIA’s  disparate  approach  to  drug  possession  and  distribution 
offenses  and  paraphernalia  possession  offenses  finds  no  home  in 
§1227(a)(2)(B)(i)’s text and “leads to consequences Congress could not 
have  intended.”    Moncrieffe  v.  Holder,  569  U. S.  ___,  ___.    That  ap-
proach has the anomalous result of treating less grave paraphernalia
possession  misdemeanors  more  harshly  than  drug  possession  and
distribution offenses.  The incongruous upshot is that an alien is not 
removable  for  possessing  a  substance  controlled  only  under  Kansas 
law,  but  he  is  removable  for  using  a  sock  to  contain  that  substance.
Because  it  makes  scant  sense,  the  BIA’s  interpretation  is  owed  no 
deference  under  the  doctrine  described  in  Chevron  U. S. A.  Inc.  v. 
Natural  Resources  Defense  Council,  Inc.,  467  U. S.  837,  843.    Pp. 5– 
11. 

(b) The  Government’s  interpretation  of  the  statute  is  similarly 
flawed.  The  Government  argues  that  aliens  who  commit  any  drug
crime,  not  just  paraphernalia  offenses,  in  States  whose  drug  sched-
ules  substantially  overlap  the  federal  schedules  are  deportable,  for
“state  statutes  that  criminalize  hundreds  of  federally  controlled 
drugs and a handful of similar substances, are laws ‘relating to’ fed-
erally  controlled  substances.”    Brief  for  Respondent  17.    While  the 
words “relating to” are broad, the Government’s reading stretches the
construction of §1227(a)(2)(B)(i) to the breaking point, reaching state-