Opinion ID: 708223
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: the due process challenge to the use of classified information

Text: 88
89 The district court's grant of a permanent injunction is reviewed for an abuse of discretion or application of erroneous legal principles. United States v. Yacoubian, 24 F.3d 1, 3 (9th Cir.1994) (quoting Dexter v. Kirschner, 984 F.2d 979, 982 (9th Cir.1992)). Questions of law or mixed questions of law and fact implicating constitutional rights are reviewed de novo. LaDuke, 762 F.2d at 1322. The requirements for the issuance of a permanent injunction are the likelihood of substantial and immediate irreparable injury and the inadequacy of remedies at law. Id. at 1330 (citations omitted). 90
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92 Aliens who reside in this country are entitled to full due process protections. Diaz, 426 U.S. at 77, 96 S.Ct. at 1890 (citations omitted); see also Plasencia, 459 U.S. at 32, 103 S.Ct. at 329 (finding that a returning longtime resident alien, unlike an alien seeking initial admission, has due process rights to an exclusion hearing); Mezei, 345 U.S. at 212, 73 S.Ct. at 629 (1953) (stating that aliens who have once passed through our gates, even illegally, may be expelled only after proceedings conforming to traditional standards of fairness encompassed in due process of law). 93 The Government does not dispute that the Due Process Clause protects Barakat and Sharif, but it contends that reliance on undisclosed information to determine legalization satisfies the demands of due process. 94
95 Barakat and Sharif applied for legalization in 1987. Section 201(a)(1) of IRCA establishes a two-step process by which illegal aliens who satisfy the eligibility requirements receive temporary resident status and then, after an additional time in the country, permanent resident status. 8 U.S.C. Sec. 1255a. Among other criteria, the alien must demonstrate admissibility as an immigrant. 8 U.S.C. Sec. 1255a(a)(4). The Attorney General must grant temporary and permanent status if the applicants satisfy the statutory criteria. 8 U.S.C. Secs. 1255a(a), (b). 96 At the time that Barakat and Sharif applied for legalization, the INS regulations required that all issues of statutory eligibility for immigration benefits, including legalization, be determined solely on the basis of information in the record disclosed to the applicant. 8 C.F.R. Sec. 103.2(b)(3)(ii) (1990); see also 8 C.F.R. Secs. 103.2(b)(3)(iii), (iv) (1990); 8 C.F.R. Sec. 242.17 (1994) (allowing use of undisclosed, classified information only for discretionary decisions). However, after a three-year delay, the INS finally issued Notices of Intent to Deny to Barakat and Sharif in March 1991, pursuant to amended regulations, effective upon publication as interim rules in January 1991, that extended the confidential use of classified information to statutory entitlement determinations. 8 C.F.R. Secs. 103.2(b)(3)(ii), (iv) (1994) (as amended). The INS claimed that the information's protection from unauthorized disclosure is required in the interests of national security, as provided in 8 C.F.R. Sec. 103.2(b)(3)(iv). 97 The Government cites section 235(c) of the Immigration and Nationality Act, 8 U.S.C. Sec. 1225(c) (as amended), as authority for use of the undisclosed classified information in the legalization determination. That statute establishes the powers of INS officers to inspect aliens seeking admission or readmission, 8 U.S.C. Sec. 1225(a), to temporarily detain aliens who are not entitled to enter at the port of arrival, 8 U.S.C. Sec. 1225(b), and to exclude aliens on the particular finding by the Attorney General that confidential information supports that exclusion, 8 U.S.C. Sec. 1225(c) (allowing summary process for exclusion). We do not, however, accept the proposition that denying a resident alien legalization is the same thing as exclusion. 98 Use of summary process in settings other than exclusion raises troubling due process concerns. See, e.g., Kwong Hai Chew, 344 U.S. 590, 73 S.Ct. 472 (barring the INS from using summary process to exclude a resident alien returning from abroad, because he was entitled to a hearing as of constitutional right). Thus, even reentering permanent resident aliens, who enjoy few rights because of the admitted power of Congress over entry into the country, are entitled to additional due process safeguards when subjected to the summary exclusion process. Rafeedie, 880 F.2d at 512, on remand, 795 F.Supp. 13, 20 (D.D.C.1992) (applying the Mathews balancing test to determine that subjecting a returning resident alien, who was accused of being a PFLP officer, to summary exclusion proceedings utilizing secret information violated due process); see also United States ex rel. Kasel de Pagliera v. Savoretti, 139 F.Supp. 143 (S.D.Fla.1956) (holding summary exclusion of returning permanent resident aliens unconstitutional). 99 The Government's attempt to distinguish Rafeedie from the case at bar on the ground that legalization is a benefit is unpersuasive. Reentry is also a benefit--one for which aliens have no constitutional entitlement. Plasencia, 459 U.S. at 32, 103 S.Ct. at 329 (an alien seeking initial admission to the United States requests a privilege). 100 This limitation of the classified information provision to the exclusion context comports with the requirement that administrative and judicial review of deportation orders be based on reasonable, substantial, and probative evidence on the record considered as a whole. 8 U.S.C. Sec. 1105a(a)(4); see Whetstone v. INS, 561 F.2d 1303, 1306 (9th Cir.1977) (finding that [d]eportation on a charge not presented in the order to show cause, or at the hearing, would offend due process because record evidence must establish the basis for deportation). Because legalization decisions are reviewable under the deportation review provisions, the statutory scheme does not support use of summary process which relies on secret information as an alternative to regular hearing requirements. 101 The Government asserts, however, that under case law allowing use of undisclosed information for determinations that are statutorily unreviewable because they are delegated to the Attorney General's sole discretion, it has full statutory authority to use secret information to decide a legalization application. See Jay v. Boyd, 351 U.S. 345, 76 S.Ct. 919, 100 L.Ed. 1242 (1956). Interpreting the statutory provision for suspension of deportation, 8 U.S.C. Sec. 1254, the Jay Court upheld the use of undisclosed information to inform the Attorney General's decision on the grounds that Congress explicitly delegated the decision to her unfettered discretion as an act of grace. Id. at 354, 76 S.Ct. at 924-25. The statutory provision under consideration here, in contrast, requires that the Attorney General shall adjust the alien's status if the statutory eligibility requirements are satisfied. See 8 U.S.C. Sec. 1255a(a). Thus, the extension of use of confidential information to mandatory statutory provisions such as the one at issue here is not warranted by the Jay rationale. 7 102 The Government's reliance on Campos v. INS, 402 F.2d 758 (9th Cir.1968), is similarly misplaced. Dictum in that case suggests that an alien applying for legalization under the discretionary statute, 8 U.S.C. Sec. 1255, is assimilated to the position of (treated as) an entering alien both in terms of eligibility criteria and in terms of procedural rights. Id. at 760. Our later cases, however, have interpreted this assimilation rule narrowly, holding that it refers to the application of eligibility criteria for admission and to differences in burden of proof. Firestone v. Howerton, 671 F.2d 317, 320 & 320 n. 5 (9th Cir.1982). Moreover, further assimilation of applicants to the position of an alien at entry would virtually eliminate the primary distinction between aliens at entry and aliens residing within the country. Therefore, although applicants for legalization must satisfy the substantive admissibility requirements, their constitutional rights, including their right to procedural due process, are not correspondingly diminished. Thus, we find that there is no statutory or regulatory basis supporting the Government's interest in use of classified information in legalization decisions pursuant to Sec. 1255a. 103
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105 Aliens who have resided for more than a decade in this country, even those whose status is now unlawful because of technical visa violations, have a strong liberty interest in remaining in their homes. See, e.g., Plasencia, 459 U.S. at 34, 103 S.Ct. at 330; Firestone, 671 F.2d at 321 n. 10 (noting that the equities of long residence in the country are relevant to legalization). Similarly, the denial of legalization impacts the opportunity of an alien to work, which also raises constitutional concerns. HRC, 498 U.S. at 491, 111 S.Ct. at 895. The statute provides an entitlement not subject to denial according to the discretion of the Attorney General, as long as the eligibility requirements are satisfied. 8 U.S.C. Sec. 1255a(a). Thus, the district court did not err in finding that the private interests affected are truly substantial. 106
107 There is no direct evidence in the record to show what percentage of decisions utilizing undisclosed classified information result in error; yet, as the district court below stated, One would be hard pressed to design a procedure more likely to result in erroneous deprivations. See, e.g., Goss v. Lopez, 419 U.S. 565, 580, 95 S.Ct. 729, 739, 42 L.Ed.2d 725 (1975) (finding that the risk of error is not at all trivial in summary discipline in school settings). Without any opportunity for confrontation, there is no adversarial check on the quality of the information on which the INS relies. See Knauff, 338 U.S. at 551, 70 S.Ct. at 316 (Jackson, J., dissenting) (The plea that evidence of guilt must be secret is abhorrent to free men, because it provides a cloak for the malevolent, the misinformed, the meddlesome, and the corrupt to play the role of informer undetected and uncorrected.) (citation omitted). 108 Although not all rights of criminal defendants are applicable to the civil context, the procedural due process notice and hearing requirements have ancient roots in the rights to confrontation and cross-examination. Greene v. McElroy, 360 U.S. 474, 496, 79 S.Ct. 1400, 1413, 3 L.Ed.2d 1377 (1959). 109 Certain principles have remained relatively immutable in our jurisprudence. One of these is that where governmental action seriously injures an individual, and the reasonableness of the action depends on fact findings, the evidence used to prove the Government's case must be disclosed to the individual so that he has an opportunity to show that it is untrue. 110 Id. As judges, we are necessarily wary of one-sided process: democracy implies respect for the elementary rights of men ... and must therefore practice fairness; and fairness can rarely be obtained by secret, one-sided determination of facts decisive of rights. Anti-Fascist Committee v. McGrath, 341 U.S. 123, 170, 71 S.Ct. 624, 647-48, 95 L.Ed. 817 (1951) (Frankfurter, J., concurring). It is therefore the firmly held main rule that a court may not dispose of the merits of a case on the basis of ex parte, in camera submissions. Abourezk, 785 F.2d at 1061. Thus, the very foundation of the adversary process assumes that use of undisclosed information will violate due process because of the risk of error. We conclude that the district court did not err in finding that there is an exceptionally high risk of erroneous deprivation when undisclosed information is used to determine the merits of the admissibility inquiry. 111
112 The Government seeks to use undisclosed information to achieve its desired outcome of prohibiting these individuals whom it perceives to be threats to national security from remaining in the United States while protecting its confidential sources involved in the investigation of terrorist organizations. Yet the Government has offered no evidence to demonstrate that these particular aliens threaten the national security of this country. In fact, the Government claims that it need not. It relies on general pronouncements in two State Department publications about the PFLP's involvement in global terrorism and on the President's recent broad Executive Order prohibiting any United States persons from transacting business with the PFLP. See Exec.Order No. 12947 (January 23, 1995) (finding that grave acts of violence committed by foreign terrorists that disrupt the Middle East peace process constitute an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security, foreign policy, and economy of the United States). We take judicial notice of these government documents on appeal for the limited purpose of assessing the strength of the Government's interest, see, e.g., Castillo-Villagra v. INS, 972 F.2d 1017, 1030 (9th Cir.1992) (noticing a State Department report to assist in determining the plausibility of the petitioner's claim), yet we find these data insufficient to tip the Mathews scale towards the Government. These aliens have been free since the beginning of this litigation almost eight years ago, without criminal charges being brought against them for their activities. According to the district court, the government's in camera submission targets the PFLP: although it indicates that the PFLP advocates prohibited doctrines and that the aliens are members, it does not indicate that either alien has personally advocated those doctrines or has participated in terrorist activities. 113 If Barakat and Sharif engage in any deportable activities, the government is not precluded from contesting their legalization or from instituting deportation on the basis of non-secret information. If the Government chooses not to reveal its information in order to protect its sources, the only risk it faces is that attendant to tolerance of Barakat's and Sharif's presence so long as they do not engage in deportable activities. Thus, although the Government undoubtedly has a legitimate interest in protecting its confidential investigations, it has not demonstrated a strong interest in this case in accomplishing its goal of protecting its information while prohibiting these aliens' legalization. 114 The Government's attempt to bolster its interest by relying on permitted uses of undisclosed information is misguided. Although the courts have allowed the Government to keep certain information confidential, the exceptions to full disclosure are narrowly circumscribed. Abourezk, 785 F.2d at 1061. For example, a formal claim of a state secrets privilege may prevent discovery and shield the use of materials against the Government in tort litigation for damages. Id.; see also United States v. Reynolds, 345 U.S. 1, 6-7, 73 S.Ct. 528, 531-32, 97 L.Ed. 727 (1953) (in a tort suit against the Government, permitting nonproduction of an Air Force accident investigation report because of national security concerns); Ellsberg v. Mitchell, 709 F.2d 51 (D.C.Cir.1983) (in a constitutional tort suit for damages against officials, allowing the Government to withhold production of wiretap information), cert. denied, 465 U.S. 1038, 104 S.Ct. 1316, 79 L.Ed.2d 712 (1984). However, the failure to disclose information prevents its use in the adversary proceeding: the effect of upholding the privilege is that the evidence is unavailable, as though a witness had died. Ellsberg, 709 F.2d at 64. Even in those rare cases when the privilege operates as a complete shield to the government and results in the dismissal of a plaintiff's suit, the information is simply unavailable and may not be used by either side. Id.; In re United States, 872 F.2d 472 (D.C.Cir.), cert. dismissed, 493 U.S. 960, 110 S.Ct. 398, 107 L.Ed.2d 365 (1989); Molerio v. F.B.I., 749 F.2d 815, 820-22 (D.C.Cir.1984) (dismissing a Title VII complaint). Here, the Government does not seek to shield state information from disclosure in the adjudication of a tort claim against it; instead, it seeks to use secret information as a sword against the aliens. 115 Because of the danger of injustice when decisions lack the procedural safeguards that form the core of constitutional due process, the Mathews balancing suggests that use of undisclosed information in adjudications should be presumptively unconstitutional. Only the most extraordinary circumstances could support one-sided process. We cannot in good conscience find that the President's broad generalization regarding a distant foreign policy concern and a related national security threat suffices to support a process that is inherently unfair because of the enormous risk of error and the substantial personal interests involved. [T]he fact that a given law or procedure is efficient, convenient, and useful in facilitating functions of government, standing alone, will not save it if it is contrary to the Constitution. Chadha, 462 U.S. at 944, 103 S.Ct. at 2780. Therefore, we find that the district court did not err in deciding that use of undisclosed classified information under these circumstances violates due process.3. Applicability of Permanent Injunction Standards 116 Because there is no adequate remedy at law to compensate for denial of legalization based on a constitutional violation, and because the use of secret information about their affiliation with the PFLP irreparably injures Barakat and Sharif by depriving them of a strong liberty interest without due process and, indirectly, by chilling their First Amendment rights of expression and association, we affirm the district court's grant of a permanent injunction against use of undisclosed information to adjudicate Barakat's and Sharif's legalization applications.