Source: https://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/97-1252.ZO.html
Timestamp: 2019-04-21 12:49:33+00:00

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119 F.3d 1367, vacated and remanded.
PETITIONERS v. AMERICAN-ARAB ANTI-DISCRIMINATION COMMITTEE et al.
Respondents sued petitioners for allegedly targeting them for deportation because of their affiliation with a politically unpopular group. While their suit was pending, Congress passed the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996, 110 Stat. 3009546 (IIRIRA), which contains a provision restricting judicial review of the Attorney Generals decision or action to commence proceedings, adjudicate cases, or execute removal orders against any alien under this Act. 8 U.S.C. § 1252(g) (1994 ed., Supp. III). The issue before us is whether, as petitioners contend, this provision deprives the federal courts of jurisdiction over respondents suit.
world communism. See 8 U.S.C. § 1251(a)(6)(D), (G)(v), and (H) (1982 ed.). In addition, the INS charged the first six, who were only temporary residents, with routine status violations such as overstaying a visa and failure to maintain student status.1 See 8 U.S.C. § 1251(a)(2) and (a)(9) (1988 ed.).
Since this suit seeking to prevent the initiation of deportation proceedings was filedin 1987, during the administration of Attorney General Edwin Meeseit has made four trips through the District Court for the Central District of California and the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. The first two concerned jurisdictional issues not now before us. See Hamide v. United States District Court, No. 877249 (CA9, Feb. 24, 1988); American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee v. Thornburgh, 970 F.2d 501 (CA9 1991). Then, in 1994, the District Court preliminarily enjoined deportation proceedings against the six temporary residents, holding that they were likely to prove that the INS did not enforce routine status requirements against immigrants who were not members of disfavored terrorist groups and that the possibility of deportation, combined with the chill to their First Amendment rights while the proceedings were pending, constituted irreparable injury. With regard to Hamide and Shehadehs claims, however, the District Court granted summary judgment to the federal parties for reasons not pertinent here.
American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee v. Reno, 70 F.3d 1045 (CA9 1995), a case that we shall call AADC I was the Ninth Circuits first merits determination in this case, upholding the injunction as to the six and reversing the District Court with regard to Hamide and Shehadeh. The opinion rejected the Attorney Generals argument that selective-enforcement claims are inappropriate in the immigration context, and her alternative argument that the special statutory-review provision of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), 8 U.S.C. § 1105a precluded review of such a claim until a deportation order issued. See 70 F.3d, at 10561057. The Ninth Circuit remanded the case to the District Court, which entered an injunction in favor of Hamide and Shehadeh and denied the Attorney Generals request that the existing injunction be dissolved in light of new evidence that all respondents participated in fundraising activities of the PFLP.
While the Attorney Generals appeal of this last decision was pending, Congress passed IIRIRA which, inter alia, repealed the old judicial-review scheme set forth in §1105a and instituted a new (and significantly more restrictive) one in 8 U.S.C. §1252. The Attorney General filed motions in both the District Court and Court of Appeals, arguing that §1252(g) deprived them of jurisdiction over respondents selective-enforcement claim. The District Court denied the motion, and the Attorney Generals appeal from that denial was consolidated with the appeal already pending in the Ninth Circuit.
It is the judgment and opinion in that appeal which is before us here: American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee v. Reno, 119 F.3d 1367 (CA9 1997), which we shall call AADC II. It affirmed the existence of jurisdiction under §1252, see id., at 1374, and reaching the merits of the injunctions, again affirmed the District Court, id., at 13741376. The Attorney Generals petition for rehearing en banc was denied over the dissent of three judges, 132 F.3d 531 (CA9 1997). The Attorney General sought our review, and we granted certiorari, 524 U.S. ___ (1998).
This provision seemingly governs here, depriving the federal courts of jurisdiction [e]xcept as provided in this section. But whether it is as straightforward as that depends upon the scope of the quoted text. Here, and in the courts below, both petitioners and respondents have treated §1252(g) as covering all or nearly all deportation claims. The Attorney General has characterized it as a channeling provision, requiring aliens to bring all deportation-related claims in the context of a petition for review of a final order of deportation filed in the court of appeals. Supplemental Brief for Appellants in No. 9655929 (CA9), p. 2. Respondents have described it as applying to most of what INS does. Corrected Supplemental Brief for Appellees in No. 9655929 (CA9), p. 7. This broad understanding of §1252(g), combined with IIRIRAs effective-date provisions, creates an interpretive anomaly. If the jurisdiction-excluding provision of §1252(g) eliminates other sources of jurisdiction in all deportation-related cases, and if the phrase in §1252(g) [e]xcept as provided in this section incorporates (as one would suppose) all the other jurisdiction-related provisions of §1252, then §309(c)(1) would be rendered a virtual nullity. To say that there is no jurisdiction in pending INS cases except as §1252 provides jurisdiction is simply to say that §1252s jurisdictional limitations apply to pending cases as well as future caseswhich seems hardly what §309(c)(1) is about. If, on the other hand, the phrase [e]xcept as provided in this section were (somehow) interpreted not to incorporate the other jurisdictional provisions of §1252if §1252(g) stood alone, so to speakjudicial review would be foreclosed for all deportation claims in all pending deportation cases, even after entry of a final order.
The Attorney General would have us avoid the horns of this dilemma by interpreting §1252(g)s phrase [e]xcept as provided in this section to mean except as provided in §1105a. Because §1105a authorizes review of only final orders, respondents must, she says, wait until their administrative proceedings come to a close and then seek review in a court of appeals. (For reasons mentioned above, the Attorney General of course rejects the Ninth Circuits position in AADC I that application of §1105a would leave respondents without a judicial forum because evidence of selective prosecution cannot be introduced into the administrative record.) The obvious difficulty with the Attorney Generals interpretation is that it is impossible to understand how the qualifier in §1252(g), [e]xcept as provided in this section (emphasis added), can possibly mean except as provided in §1105a. And indeed the Attorney General makes no attempt to explain how this can be, except to observe that what she calls a literal application of the statute would create an anomalous result. Brief for Petitioners 30, n. 15.
Divorced from all other jurisdictional provisions of IIRIRA, subsection (g) would have a more sweeping impact on cases filed before the statutes enactment than after that date. Without incorporating any exceptions, the provision appears to cut off federal jurisdiction over all deportation decisions. We do not think that Congress intended such an absurd result. 119 F.3d, at 1372.
The Ninth Circuit replied that, even if §1252(b)(9) were one of those provisions incorporated into the transitional application of §1252(g), it could not preclude this suit for the same reason AADC I had held that §1105a could not do sonamely, the Court of Appeals lack of access to factual findings regarding selective enforcement.
Even respondents scarcely try to defend the Ninth Circuits reading of §1252(f) as a jurisdictional grant. By its plain terms, and even by its title, that provision is nothing more or less than a limit on injunctive relief. It prohibits federal courts from granting classwide injunctive relief against the operation of §§12211231, but specifies that this ban does not extend to individual cases. To find in this an affirmative grant of jurisdiction is to go beyond what the language will bear.
We think the seeming anomaly that prompted the parties strained readings of §1252(g)and that at least accompanied the Court of Appeals strained readingis a mirage. The parties interpretive acrobatics flow from the belief that §306(c)(1) cannot be read to envision a straightforward application of the [e]xcept as provided in this section portion of §1252(g), since that would produce in all pending INS cases jurisdictional restrictions identical to those that were contained in IIRIRA anyway. That belief, however, rests on the unexamined assumption that §1252(g) covers the universe of deportation claimsthat it is a sort of zipper clause that says no judicial review in deportation cases unless this section provides judicial review. In fact, what §1252(g) says is much narrower. The provision applies only to three discrete actions that the Attorney General may take: her decision or action to commence proceedings, adjudicate cases, or execute removal orders. (Emphasis added.) There are of course many other decisions or actions that may be part of the deportation processsuch as the decisions to open an investigation, to surveil the suspected violator, to reschedule the deportation hearing, to include various provisions in the final order that is the product of the adjudication, and to refuse reconsideration of that order.
It is implausible that the mention of three discrete events along the road to deportation was a shorthand way of referring to all claims arising from deportation proceedings. Not because Congress is too unpoetic to use synecdoche, but because that literary device is incompatible with the need for precision in legislative drafting. We are aware of no other instance in the United States Code in which language such as this has been used to impose a general jurisdictional limitation; and that those who enacted IIRIRA were familiar with the normal manner of imposing such a limitation is demonstrated by the text of §1252(b)(9), which stands in stark contrast to §1252(g).
It could be argued, perhaps, that §1252(g) is redundant if it channels judicial review of only some decisions and actions, since §1252(b)(9) channels judicial review of all of them anyway. But that is not so, since only §1252(g), and not §1252(b)(9) (except to the extent it is incorporated within §1252(g)), applies to what § 309(c)(1) calls transitional cases, that is, cases pending on the effective date of IIRIRA. That alone justifies its existence. It performs the function of categorically excluding from non-final-order judicial revieweven as to transitional cases otherwise governed by §1105a rather than the unmistakable zipper clause of §1252(b)(9)certain specified decisions and actions of the INS. In addition, even after all the transitional cases have passed through the system, §1252(g) as we interpret it serves the continuing function of making it clear that those specified decisions and actions, which (as we shall discuss in detail below) some courts had held not to be included within the non-final-order review prohibition of §1105a, are covered by the zipper clause of §1252(b)(9). It is rather the Court of Appeals and the parties interpretation which renders §1252(g) entirely redundant, adding to one zipper clause that does not apply to transitional cases, another one of equal scope that does apply to transitional cases. That makes it entirely inexplicable why the transitional provisions of §306(c) refer to §1252(g) instead of §1252(b)(9)and why §1252(g) exists at all.
To ameliorate a harsh and unjust outcome, the INS may decline to institute proceedings, terminate proceedings, or decline to execute a final order of deportation. This commendable exercise in administrative discretion, developed without express statutory authorization, originally was known as nonpriority and is now designated as deferred action. A case may be selected for deferred action treatment at any stage of the administrative process. Approval of deferred action status means that, for the humanitarian reasons described below, no action will thereafter be taken to proceed against an apparently deportable alien, even on grounds normally regarded as aggravated. 6 C. Gordon, S. Mailman, & S. Yale-Loehr, Immigration Law and Procedure §72.03[h] (1998).
See also Johns v. Department of Justice, 653 F.2d 884, 890892 (CA5 1981). Since no generous act goes unpunished, however, the INSs exercise of this discretion opened the door to litigation in instances where the INS chose not to exercise it.
[I]n each such instance, the determination to withhold or terminate deportation is confined to administrative discretion. . . . Efforts to challenge the refusal to exercise such discretion on behalf of specific aliens sometimes have been favorably considered by the courts, upon contentions that there was selective prosecution in violation of equal protection or due process, such as improper reliance on political considerations, on racial, religious, or nationality discriminations, on arbitrary or unconstitutional criteria, or on other grounds constituting abuse of discretion. Gordon, Mailman, & Yale-Loehr, supra, §72.03[a] (footnotes omitted).
Of course many provisions of IIRIRA are aimed at protecting the Executives discretion from the courtsindeed, that can fairly be said to be the theme of the legislation. See, e.g., 8 U.S.C. § 1252(a)(2)(A) (limiting review of any claim arising from the inspection of aliens arriving in the United States); §1252(a)(2)(B) (barring review of denials of discretionary relief authorized by various statutory provisions); §1252(a)(2)(C) (barring review of final removal orders against criminal aliens); §1252(b)(4)(D) (limiting review of asylum determinations for resident aliens). It is entirely understandable, however, why Congress would want only the discretion-protecting provision of §1252(g) applied even to pending cases: because that provision is specifically directed at the deconstruction, fragmentation, and hence prolongation of removal proceedings.
Respondents challenge to the Attorney Generals decision to commence proceedings against them falls squarely within §1252(g)indeed, as we have discussed, the language seems to have been crafted with such a challenge precisely in mindand nothing elsewhere in §1252 provides for jurisdiction. Cf. §1252(a)(1)(review of final orders); §1252(e)(2) (limited habeas review for excluded aliens); §1252 (e)(3)(A) (limited review of statutes and regulations pertaining to the exclusion of aliens). As we concluded earlier, §1252(f) plainly serves as a limit on injunctive relief rather than a jurisdictional grant.
This broad discretion [afforded the Executive] rests largely on the recognition that the decision to prosecute is particularly ill-suited to judicial review. Such factors as the strength of the case, the prosecutions general deterrence value, the Governments enforcement priorities, and the cases relationship to the Governments overall enforcement plan are not readily susceptible to the kind of analysis the courts are competent to undertake. Judicial supervision in this area, moreover, entails systemic costs of particular concern. Examining the basis of a prosecution delays the criminal proceeding, threatens to chill law enforcement by subjecting the prosecutors motives and decisionmaking to outside inquiry, and may undermine prosecutorial effectiveness by revealing the Governments enforcement policy. All of these are substantial concerns that make the courts properly hesitant to examine the decision whether to prosecute. Wayte v. United States, 470 U.S. 598, 607608 (1985).
These concerns are greatly magnified in the deportation context. Regarding, for example, the potential for delay: Whereas in criminal proceedings the consequence of delay is merely to postpone the criminals receipt of his just deserts, in deportation proceedings the consequence is to permit and prolong a continuing violation of United States law. Postponing justifiable deportation (in the hope that the aliens status will changeby, for example, marriage to an American citizenor simply with the object of extending the aliens unlawful stay) is often the principal object of resistance to a deportation proceeding, and the additional obstacle of selective-enforcement suits could leave the INS hard pressed to enforce routine status requirements. And as for chill[ing] law enforcement by subjecting the prosecutors motives and decisionmaking to outside inquiry: What will be involved in deportation cases is not merely the disclosure of normal domestic law-enforcement priorities and techniques, but often the disclosure of foreign-policy objectives and (as in this case) foreign-intelligence products and techniques. The Executive should not have to disclose its real reasons for deeming nationals of a particular country a special threator indeed for simply wishing to antagonize a particular foreign country by focusing on that countrys nationalsand even if it did disclose them a court would be ill equipped to determine their authenticity and utterly unable to assess their adequacy. Moreover, the consideration on the other side of the ledger in deportation casesthe interest of the target in avoiding selective treatmentis less compelling than in criminal prosecutions. While the consequences of deportation may assuredly be grave, they are not imposed as a punishment, see Carlson v. Landon, 342 U.S. 524, 537 (1952). In many cases (for six of the eight aliens here) deportation is sought simply because the time of permitted residence in this country has expired, or the activity for which residence was permitted has been completed. Even when deportation is sought because of some act the alien has committed, in principle the alien is not being punished for that act (criminal charges may be available for that separate purpose) but is merely being held to the terms under which he was admitted. And in all cases, deportation is necessary in order to bring to an end an ongoing violation of United States law. The contention that a violation must be allowed to continue because it has been improperly selected is not powerfully appealing.
To resolve the present controversy, we need not rule out the possibility of a rare case in which the alleged basis of discrimination is so outrageous that the foregoing considerations can be overcome. Whether or not there be such exceptions, the general rule certainly applies here. When an aliens continuing presence in this country is in violation of the immigration laws, the Government does not offend the Constitution by deporting him for the additional reason that it believes him to be a member of an organization that supports terrorist activity.
Because 8 U.S.C. § 1252(g) deprives the federal courts of jurisdiction over respondents claims, we vacate the judgment of the Ninth Circuit and remand with instructions for it to vacate the judgment of the District Court.
*. *Justice Breyer joins Parts I and II of this opinion.
1. Respondents Barakat and Sharif were subsequently granted legalization and are no longer deportable based on the original status violations. Brief for Petitioners 11, n. 5.
2. When the McCarran-Walter Act was repealed, a new terrorist activity provision was added by the Immigration Act of 1990. See 8 U.S.C. § 1227(a)(4)(B) (1994 ed., Supp. III). The INS charged Hamide and Shehadeh under this, but it is unclear whether that was in addition to, or in substitution for, the old McCarran-Walter charges.
3. The amended complaint was styled as an action for damages and for declaratory and injunctive relief, but the only monetary relief specifically requested was costs of suit and attorneys fees. App. 20, 51.
4. This latter provision was subsequently amended by IIRIRA to make clear that it applies only to actions brought by the United States. See 8 U.S.C. § 1329 (1994 ed., Supp. III).
5. Section 309(c)(1) provides: (c) Transition for Aliens in Proceedings (1) General Rule that New Rules Do Not Apply.Subject to the succeeding provisions of this subsection [§309(a) carves out §306(c) as an exception], in the case of an alien who is in exclusion or deportation proceedings before the title IIIA effective date (A) the amendments made by this subtitle shall not apply, and (B) the proceedings (including judicial review thereof) shall continue to be conducted without regard to such amendments. 110 Stat. 3009625.
6. It is unclear why the Attorney General has not exercised this option in this case. Respondents have taken the position that the District Courts injunction prevents her from doing so. Brief for Respondents 41, n. 38.
7. There is disagreement on this point in the Courts of Appeals. Compare Hose v. INS, 141 F.3d 932, 935 (CA9) (habeas not available), withdrawn and rehg en banc granted, 161 F.3d 1225 (1998), Richardson v. Reno, 162 F.3d 1338 (CA11 1998) (same), and Yang v. INS, 109 F.3d 1185, 1195 (CA7 1997) (same), with Goncalves v. Reno, 144 F.3d 110, 122 (CA1 1998) (habeas available), and Henderson v. INS, 157 F.3d 106, 117122 (CA2 1998) (same). See also Magana-Pizano v. INS, 152 F.3d 1213, 1220 (CA9 1998) (elimination of habeas unconstitutional); Ramallo v. Reno, 114 F.3d 1210, 1214 (CADC 1997) (§1252(g) removes statutory habeas but leaves constitutional habeas intact).
8. Prior to 1997, deferred-action decisions were governed by internal INS guidelines which considered, inter alia, such factors as the likelihood of ultimately removing the alien, the presence of sympathetic factors that could adversely affect future cases or generate bad publicity for the INS, and whether the alien had violated a provision that had been given high enforcement priority. See 16 C. Gordon, S. Mailman, & S. Yale-Loehr, Immigration Law and Procedure §242.1 (1998). These were apparently rescinded on June 27, 1997, but there is no indication that the INS has ceased making this sort of determination on a case-by-case basis. See ibid.
cult to explain, see post, at 9, not only strains the imagination but ruptures the faculty of reason. We do not think our interpretation parses [§1252(g)] too finely, post, at 5; but if it did, we would think that modest fault preferable to the exercise of such a novel power of nullification. Justice Stevens, like Justice Souter, rejects §1252(g)s explicit limitation to specific steps in the deportation process. He then invokes the conflict with §306(c)(1) that this expansive interpretation creates as justification for concluding that, when §1252(g) uses the word section, it cant mean what it says, Green v. Bock Laundry Machine Co., 490 U.S. 504, 511 (1989) (internal quotation marks omitted)empowering him to declare a scrivenors error and to change the word section to Act. Justice Stevens approach, like Justice Souters, renders §1252(g) redundant of §1252(b)(9). That problem is solved by our more conventional solution: reading both commence proceedings, adjudicate cases, or execute removal orders and section to mean precisely what they say.
10. Instead of resolving this constitutional question, Justice Ginsburg chooses to resolve the constitutional question whether Congress can exclude the courts from remedying an alleged First Amendment violation with immediate effects, pending the completion of administrative proceedings. It is not clear to us that this is easier to answer than the question we addressas is evident from the fact that in resolving it Justice Ginsburg relies almost exclusively on cases dealing with the quite different question of federal-court intervention in state proceedings. (Even in that area, most of the cases she cites where we did not intervene involved no claim of present injury from the state actionand none involved what we have here: an admission by the Government that the alleged First Amendment activity was the basis for selecting the individuals for adverse action. Cf. Dombrowski v. Pfister, 380 U.S. 479, 487488, n. 4 (1965).) The one case not involving federal-state relations in fact overrode a congressional requirement for completion of administrative proceedingseven though, unlike here, no immediate harm was apparent. See Oestereich v. Selective Serv. System Local Bd. No. 11, 393 U.S. 233 (1968). Justice Ginsburg counts the case as one for her side on the basis of nothing more substantial than the Courts characterization of the agency action at issue as blatantly lawless, id., at 238. See post, at 3. Nor is it clear that the constitutional question Justice Ginsburg addresses has narrower application and effect than the one we resolve. Our holding generally deprives deportable aliens of the defense of selective prosecution. Hers allows all citizens and resident aliens to be deprived of constitutional rights (at least where the deprivation is not blatantly lawless) pending the completion of agency proceedings. Finally, Justice Ginsburg acknowledges that her constitutional conclusion might be different if a court of appeals reviewing final orders of removal against respondents could not consider their selective enforcement claims. Post, at 4. But she never establishes that a court of appeals can consider their selective enforcement claims, though she expresses confiden[ce] (despite the Ninth Circuits holding to the contrary) that that would be the outcome. Post, at 5, n. 2. How well-founded that confidence is may be assessed by considering the first and most substantial option upon which it is based, namely, the Attorney Generals position that the reviewing court of appeals may transfer a case to a district court . . . and counsels assurance at oral argument that petitioners will adhere to that position . . . . Post, at 5. What petitioners primarily rely upon for this concession is the provision of the Hobbs Act that authorizes remand to the agency or transfer to a district court [w]hen the agency has not held a hearing. 28 U.S.C. § 2347(b). It is not at all clear that this should be interpreted to mean when the agencys hearing has not addressed the particular point at issueespecially since that situation is specifically covered by §2347(c) (providing for remand in such circumstances), which the new amendments explicitly render inapplicable to deportation cases, see 8 U.S.C. § 1252(a)(1) (1994 ed., Supp. III). Petitioners position is cast further in doubt by the fact that the Hobbs Act remedy for failure to hold a hearing required by law is not the transfer which petitioners assert, but remand, see 28 U.S.C. § 2347(b)(1). Of course petitioners promise not to quibble over this transfer point is of no value, since the point goes to jurisdiction and must be raised by the District Court sua sponte. It is quite possible, therefore, that what Justice Ginsburgs approach would ultimately accomplish in this litigation is requiring us to address both the constitutional issue she now addresses and (upon termination of the administrative proceedings) the constitutional issue we now resolve. We think it preferable to resolve only the one (and we think narrower) issue at once.

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