Court Opinion

ID: 9559479
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 17:30:03.308242+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:11:11.701302
License: Public Domain

IKUTA, Circuit Judge,
concurring:
Though Congress determined that an alien who is found guilty and subject to some form of penalty ordered by the court is considered to have a “conviction” for purposes of immigration law, 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(48)(A), our cases have all but written this requirement out of the INA. Beginning in Lujan-Armendariz v. INS, we reached the erroneous conclusion that the Equal Protection Clause required us to hold that an alien did not have a “convic*958tion” for immigration purposes if: (1) the alien was “adjudged guilty” of a state crime that was expunged under state law; and (2) the alien would have qualified for expungement under the Federal First Offender Act (FFOA) if adjudged guilty of an identical federal crime. See 222 F.3d 728, 749-50 (9th Cir.2000). As every other circuit to consider this issue has noted, this equal protection analysis is meritless. See Ramirez-Altamirano v. Holder, 563 F.3d 800, 816-17 (9th Cir.2009) (Ikuta, J., dissenting) (collecting cases).
From this dubious starting point, we have step by step traveled further afield from any reasonable interpretation of the INA, holding that an alien does not have a conviction for immigration purposes even if the alien would not have qualified for expungement under the FFOA, see Cardenas-Uriarte v. INS, 227 F.3d 1132, 1137-38 (9th Cir.2000), or has not received state law relief equivalent to expungement under the FFOA, see Ramirez-Altamirano, 563 F.3d at 812. Indeed, our treatment of state relief statutes does not even track state law: Under our case law, though the state can rely on the facts of an expunged state law conviction in subsequent prosecutions, see Cal.Penal Code § 1203.4(a), we forbid the BIA to rely on the expunged state law conviction for any purpose, see Romero v. Holder, 568 F.3d 1054, 1061-62 (9th Cir.2009).
Today, compelled by these precedents, we extend this judge-made edifice even further, holding that the BIA may not consider for any purpose a state crime (using or being under the influence of a controlled substance in violation of California Health & Safety Code § 11550) that neither qualifies for FFOA treatment nor received state law relief equivalent to that under the FFOA. In reaching this conclusion, we again overrule the BIA’s determination that such convictions should retain immigration consequences under the INA, even though: (1) we owe deference to the BIA’s interpretation that the state conviction has immigration consequences under the INA, see INS v. Aguirre-Aguirre, 526 U.S. 415, 425, 119 S.Ct. 1439, 143 L.Ed.2d 590 (1999); (2) Congress has expressly amended the INA to define “conviction” in a manner that includes expunged state convictions, see 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(48)(A); and (3) the Supreme Court has informed us that Congress may “allow[ ] benefits to some aliens but not to others,” Mathews v. Diaz, 426 U.S. 67, 80, 96 S.Ct. 1883, 48 L.Ed.2d 478 (1976), and that such delineations “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,” FCC v. Beach Commc’ns, Inc., 508 U.S. 307, 313, 113 S.Ct. 2096, 124 L.Ed.2d 211 (1993).
Our case law compels me to join the majority. I lament, however, that we have drifted so far off the path counseled by Congress, the Supreme Court, and our sister circuits. The creeping expansion of federal common law in this area calls out for us to revisit and correct this questionable line of precedent.