Opinion ID: 772839
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Sad's Constitutional Arguments

Text: 25 Sad contends that the BIA's application of the statute to his application for suspension of deportation violates the Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause because it impermissibly and retroactively interferes with vested property and liberty interests. Additionally, Sad contends that the BIA's interpretation of the statute arbitrarily and irrationally discriminates between similarly situated aliens in violation of the equal protection component of the Clause.
26 Although Sad correctly asserts that the Due Process Clause protects even aliens illegally in this country, Mathews v. Diaz, 426 U.S. 67, 77 (1976) (citing Wong Wing v. United States, 163 U.S. 228, 238 (1896)), aliens illegally in the United States do not have a fundamental right to remain. Harisiades v. Shaughnessy, 342 U.S. 580, 586-87 (1952); Shaar v. INS, 141 F.3d 953, 958 (9th Cir. 1998). Nonetheless, the proceedings by which the federal government removes such aliens are subject to constitutional limitations. Mathews, 426 U.S. at 77. Due process requires a full and fair hearing in deportation proceedings. Cuadras v. INS, 910 F.2d 567, 573 (9th Cir. 1990). Here, Sad received a hearing before an IJ and pursued an appeal to the BIA. Rather than contest the fairness of either proceeding, he challenges the pretermission of his application for suspension of deportation. 27 Under immigration law prior to enactment of the IIRIRA, as it exists today as amended by the NACARA, and as it applies to cases in the transitional period, the Attorney General may grant applications for suspension of deportation (or cancellation of removal) to qualifying aliens in his sole discretion. The decision to grant an application, then, amounts to an act of grace. INS v. Yueh-Shaio Yang, 519 U.S. 26, 30 (1996). Even if an alien satisfies the conditions to qualify for relief, the Attorney General retains discretion to grant or deny the application. Babai v. INS, 985 F.2d 252, 253 (6th Cir. 1993) (citing INS v. Rios-Pineda, 471 U.S. 444, 446 (1985)). Sad's expectation at the time the INS served him with an order to show cause that he would have an opportunity to apply for suspension of deportation does not equate with liberty or property, and a constitutionally protected interest cannot arise from relief that the executive exercises unfettered discretion to award. Tefel, 180 F.3d at 1300 (citing Connecticut Bd. OfPardons v. Dumschat, 452 U.S. 458, 465 (1981)). Therefore, due process at most affords Sad the right to the hearing he had as part of the deportation proceeding and, because he possesses no liberty or property interest in suspension of deportation, application of the stop-time rule does not unconstitutionally interfere with Sad's rights. 28 Nor does the transitional stop-time rule retroactively interfere with whatever expectations Sad might have had regarding the proceeding. In Landgraf v. USI Film Prods., 511 U.S. 244 (1994), the Supreme Court established a two-step inquiry in cases implicating federal statutes enacted after the events in controversy. First, we examine whether Congress has expressly prescribed the statute's proper reach. Id. at 280. Because we resolve interpretation of the statute by deferring to the BIA under Chevron, we also conclude that Congress has not expressly or precisely demarcated its proper temporal reach. Second, without such an express command, we must determine whether the statute has retroactive effect. Id. By retroactive effect, the Court means whether [a statute] would impair rights a party possessed when he acted, increase a party's liability for past conduct, or impose new duties with respect to transactions already completed. If the statute would operate retroactively, our traditional presumption teaches that it does not govern absent clear congressional intent favoring such a result. Id. The discretionary nature of the relief sought concludes the retroactivity inquiry. Because Landgraf treats retroactivity as turning on the impairment of rights a party possessed prior to enactment of the statute at issue, the stop-time rule cannot have retroactive effect. Prior to enactment of the IIRIRA, Sad possessed no right to suspension of deportation, which the Attorney General may grant in his discretion, and without retroactive effect the presumption against retroactivity will not operate. Appiah, 202 F.3d at 709. This result accords with the Supreme Court's understanding that statutes do not operate retroactively merely because applied to cases arising from actions preceding the statute's enactment. Landgraf, 511 U.S. at 269. 29 Sad raises the potentially unconstitutional effect of denying aliens a hearing on the sufficiency of process as an additional argument that the BIA's interpretation of the stop-time rule violates due process. Pointing out that aliens frequently admit service of process because they believe they will qualify for suspension of deportation, Sad maintains the effect of the stop-time rule is to change the legal significance of an order to show cause since its service under the transitional rule pretermits the application for suspension of deportation. In other words, thinking that he can apply for suspension of deportation, an alien will not challenge the sufficiency of process. Once the stop-time rule applies, however, the BIA will not even consider whether the alien qualifies for suspension, and the alien has lost the opportunity to challenge the sufficiency of process. In his own case, Sad has not pointed to any defect in the service of process that rises to the level of a constitutional violation. Indeed, the order to show cause that Sad received evidently sufficed to put him on notice that the INS intended to deport him. Further, Sad has not cited, nor have we found, any authority for the proposition that the Constitution requires that aliens have a hearing specifically to challenge the sufficiency of process prior to deportation or removal. Therefore, we find no merit in this argument. 30
31 Sad raises two claims under the Fifth Amendment Due Process Clause's equalprotection principles. First, he claims that the BIA's application of the transitional rule irrationally discriminates against aliens based on when they received their orders to show cause or notices to appear. Second, Sad challenges the nationality-based exceptions in the NACARA to retroactive application of the stop-time rule.
32 The crux of Sad's argument that the BIA's application of the stop-time rule is irrational is that the transitional rule produces disparate results in individual cases consistent with no underlying rationale. In particular, Sad compares the case of an alien who evaded service of process for seven years and nonetheless remains eligible for cancellation of removal with an alien who accepted service but becomes ineligible because of retroactive application of the stop-time rule. 33 We review this claim under the rational-basis standard. Heller v. Doe, 509 U.S. 312 (1993), lays out the scope of a court's inquiry under this standard: 34 [A] legislature that creates these categories need not actually articulate at any time the purpose or rationale supporting its classification. Instead, a classification must be upheld against equal protection challenge if there is any reasonably conceivable state of facts that could provide a rational basis for the classification. A State, moreover, has no obligation to produce evidence to sustain the rationality of a statutory classification. A legislative choice is not subject to courtroom factfinding and may be based on rational speculation unsupported by evidence or empirical data. A statute is presumed constitutional, and the burden is on the one attacking the legislative arrangement to negative every conceivable basis which might support it, whether or not the basis has a foundation in the record. Finally, courts are compelled under rational-basis review to accept a legislature's generalizations even when there is an imperfect fit between means and ends. A classification does not fail rational-basis review because it is not made with mathematical nicety, or because in practice it results in some inequality. The problems of government are practical ones and may justify, if they do not require, rough accommodations--illogical, it may be, and unscientific. 35 Id. at 320-21 (internal citations and quotations omitted). In the case of immigration matters, rational-basis review requires even less because of Congress's plenary power over the field. Control over matters of immigration is a sovereign prerogative, largely within the control of the executive and the legislature. The role of the judiciary is limited to determining whether the procedures meet the essential standard of fairness under the Due Process Clause. Landon v. Plasencia, 459 U.S. 21, 34-35 (1982) (citations omitted). See also Reno v. Flores, 507 U.S. 292, 305 (1993) (Over no conceivable subject is the legislative power of Congress more complete.) (quoting Fiallo v. Bell, 430 U.S. 787, 792 (1977), quoting Oceanic Steam Navigation Co. v. Stranahan, 214 U.S. 320, 339 (1909)); Gao v. Jenifer, 185 F.3d 548, 552 (6th Cir. 1999). 36 Sad may accurately describe the state of affairs under the statute. The stop-time rule, however, represents a legitimate policy choice to remove incentives to delay deportation or removal proceedings once they have begun. That some aliens will evade service does not implicate this rationale, cf. Tefel, 180 F.3d at 1299, or render the statute irrational since Congress neednot draw lines within the statute with absolute precision.
37 Challenging the NACARA's selective application of the stop-time rule based on an alien's national origin, Sad also asserts that such constitutionally suspect discrimination cannot withstand strict scrutiny. This contention misstates the proper standard of review. We review such classifications in immigration acts under a standard even more deferential than rational-basis review. Fiallo, 430 U.S. at 795 n.6 (noting Congress's plenary power over entry of aliens and recognizing the availability of only limited judicial review over such decisions); Mathews, 426 U.S. at 79-82. Because Congress may favor some nationalities over others when enacting immigration laws, Sad's challenge to the NACARA's exemption of some aliens but not others from retroactive application of the stop-time rule fails.