Court Opinion

ID: 9473032
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 04:17:31.320649+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:43:16.920400
License: Public Domain

SNEED, Circuit Judge,
concurring in part and dissenting in part:
I concur with the majority disposition, but because I do not believe that petitioner’s challenge to the validity of the voluntary departure amendment is moot, I would reach the merits of her argument. To survive an attack alleging mootness, a suit must be a real and substantial controversy admitting of specific relief. North Carolina v. Rice, 404 U.S. 244, 246, 92 S.Ct. 402, 404, 30 L.Ed.2d 413 (1971); Bumpus v. Clark, 702 F.2d 826 (9th Cir.1983). In this case, if the challenged amendment were to be invalidated, the immigration judge’s order granting -voluntary departure in lieu of an order of deportation would necessarily be void. At that point, this court undoubtedly would fashion a remedy that would include a remand for redetermination of deportability as well as eligibility for voluntary departure based on current conditions. I cannot imagine this court refusing to provide such a remedy were it to accept the substance of the petitioner’s constitutional arguments. The controversy is therefore real, and the petitioner has a remedy available to her. Therefore, I shall now turn to the merits of her attack on the amendment.
The petitioner argues that, because the amendment applies only to a particular nationality, it denies her the equal protection of the laws. The petitioner relies on Graham v. Richardson, 403 U.S. 365, 91 S.Ct. 1848, 29 L.Ed.2d 534 (1971), to support her argument that a classification based on nationality is inherently suspect and can be justified only by a compelling governmental interest. Graham does not, however, apply when a classification is made among aliens. See Alvarez v. INS, 539 F.2d 1220, 1224 n. 3 (9th Cir.1976), cert. denied, 430 U.S. 918, 97 S.Ct. 1334, 51 L.Ed.2d 597 (1977). The Supreme Court has acknowledged the government’s “extremely broad power” to distinguish classes of aliens. Fiallo v. Bell, 430 U.S. 787, 97 S.Ct. 1473, 52 L.Ed.2d 50 (1977). Those classifications will not be struck down unless they are “wholly irrational.” Mathews v. Diaz, 426 U.S. 67, 83, 96 S.Ct. 1883, 1893, 48 L.Ed.2d 478 (1976). Ordinarily, “the power to expel or exclude aliens [is] a fundamental sovereign attribute exercised by the government’s political departments largely immune from judicial control.” Fiallo, 430 U.S. at 792, 97 S.Ct. at 1477.
Our own cases as well have repeatedly held that a rational basis is all that is required to support a classification among aliens based on national origin. See, e.g., Paointhara v. INS, 708 F.2d 472 (9th Cir.1983). The crisis in relations between the United States and Iran, precipitated by the seizure of the American embassy in Te*445heran, provided a rational basis for the challenged amendment. See Narenji v. Civiletti, 617 F.2d 745, 747-48 (D.C.Cir.1979), cert. denied, 446 U.S. 957, 100 S.Ct. 2928, 64 L.Ed.2d 815 (1980). Therefore, the petitioner’s constitutional challenge to the amendment must fail.