Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/17pdf/17-459_1o13.pdf
Page Number: 33.0

6 

PEREIRA v. SESSIONS 

ALITO, J., dissenting 

whole.  See §1229(a).  Thus, Pereira essentially “wants to 
cherry  pick  from  the  material  covered  by  the  statutory
cross-reference.  But  if  Congress  had  intended  to  refer  to 
the  definition  in  [§1229(a)(1)]  alone,  it  presumably  would 
have  done  so.”  Cyan,  Inc.  v.  Beaver  County  Employees 
Retirement Fund, 583 U. S. ___, ___ (2018) (slip op., at 9).2 

D 
Statutory  history  also  strongly  supports  the  Govern-
ment’s argument that a notice to appear should trigger the
stop-time rule even if it fails to include the date and time 
of the alien’s removal proceeding.  When Congress enacted
the  stop-time  rule,  it  decreed  that  the  rule  should  “apply
to notices to appear issued before, on, or after the date of
the  enactment  of  this  Act.”    Illegal  Immigration  Reform
and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996, §309(c)(5), 110 
Stat.  3009–627.    This  created  a  problem:  Up  until  that 
point,  there  was  no such  thing  as a  “notice  to  appear,”  so 
the  reference  to  “notices  to  appear  issued  before  . . .  this 
Act”  made  little  sense.    When  Congress  became  aware  of
the problem, it responded by clarifying that the stop-time 
rule should apply not only to notices to appear, but also “to
orders  to  show  cause  . . .  issued  before,  on,  or  after  the 
date”  of  the  clarifying  amendment’s  enactment.    Nicara-
guan  Adjustment  and  Central  American  Relief  Act, 
§203(1), 111 Stat. 2196, as amended 8 U. S. C. §1101 note. 
That clarification sheds considerable light on the question 
presented here because orders to show cause did not nec-
essarily include the date or location of proceedings (even if 

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2 According  to  the  Court,  “the  broad  reference  to  §1229(a)  is  of  no 
consequence,  because,  as  even  the  Government  concedes,  only  para-
graph  (1)  bears  on  the  meaning  of  a  ‘notice  to  appear.’ ”    Ante,  at  10. 
But  that  is  precisely  the  point:  If  “only  paragraph  (1)  bears  on  the
meaning  of  a  ‘notice  to  appear,’ ”  then  Congress’s  decision  to  refer  to 
§1229(a)  more  broadly  indicates  that  it  meant  to  do  something  other 
than to pick up the substantive requirements of §1229(a)(1).