Opinion ID: 775740
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Congressional Mandate

Text: 38 Prior to 1990, Congress imposed no limitation on when an alien could file a motion to reopen or reconsider. See 8 C.F.R. &#167 242.22 (now rescinded); Iavorski , 232 F.3d at 130-31. In response to the perception that aliens were abusing the review process to delay being deported, Congress passed the Immigration Act of 1990 (1990 Act), Pub. L. 101-649, 104 Stat. 4978. Stone v. INS, 514 U.S. 386, 399-400 (1995). As part of the 1990 Act, Congress directed the Attorney General to issue regulations with respect to the period of time in which motions to reopen and to reconsider may be offered in deportation proceedings, which regulations include a limitation on the number of such motions that may be filed and a maximum time period for the filing of such motions .. . . Immigration Act of 1990 &#167 545(d), 104 Stat. at 5066. The Joint Explanatory Statement of the Committee Conference accompanying the 1990 Act directed the Attorney General, in developing these regulations, [to] consider exceptions in the interest of justice. H.R. CONF. REP. NO. 101-955, at 133 (1990). 39 This congressional mandate is noteworthy for several reasons. First, unlike the highly detailed and technical time limits at issue in Brockamp, the mandate here is neither detailed nor technical. The mandate does not instruct the Attorney General to adopt specific time limits, but rather leaves the matter to the Attorney General's discretion. Second, the House Conference Committee instructed the Attorney General to consider exceptions in the interest of justice. In Bowen, the Court concluded that Congress had expressly authorized tolling where the statute required filing within sixty days or within such further time as the Secretary may allow. 476 U.S. at 472 n.3. Similarly, by instructing the Attorney General to permit exceptions to deadlines when justice requires, Congress has expressly authorized flexibility in the application of deadlines. See Iavorski, 232 F.3d at 131 (noting that this legislative history indicates . . . that while Congress sought to impose general limits on motions to reopen, these limits were not intended to be inflexible). If Congress really intended the filing deadline for motions to reopen to be jurisdictional, it would not have granted the Attorney General such broad flexibility: Either it would not have permitted exceptions at all, or it would have specified those exceptions itself in no uncertain terms. Cf. Brockamp, 519 U.S. at 351 (no tolling where exceptions spelled out in statute were very specific and did not include equitable tolling).