Reno v. American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Comm.

United States Supreme Court
525 U.S. 471 (1999)

ELI5:

Rule of Law:

The Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996, specifically 8 U.S.C. § 1252(g), strips federal courts of jurisdiction over claims arising from the Attorney General’s discrete decisions to “commence proceedings, adjudicate cases, or execute removal orders” against any alien.

Facts:

In 1987, the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) initiated deportation proceedings against eight individuals, including Khader Hamide and Michel Shehadeh.
All eight individuals were members of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), which the U.S. government characterized as an international terrorist and communist organization.
The INS initially charged the individuals under the McCarran-Walter Act for advocating world communism.
The INS later dropped the communism charges, but retained routine status violation charges against six of the individuals.
The remaining two, Hamide and Shehadeh, were charged under a different provision for being members of an organization advocating unlawful property destruction or the killing of government officers.
An INS regional counsel stated publicly that the charges were changed for tactical reasons but the INS was still seeking their deportation because of their affiliation with the PFLP.

Procedural Posture:

Respondents (aliens) filed suit in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California against petitioners (the Attorney General and INS officials), seeking injunctive and declaratory relief.
The District Court preliminarily enjoined deportation proceedings against six of the respondents.
On appeal, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed the injunction and reversed a grant of summary judgment in favor of the government as to the other two respondents.
The case was remanded, and the District Court entered an injunction for the remaining two respondents.
While the Attorney General's appeal of this subsequent decision was pending, Congress enacted IIRIRA, which included 8 U.S.C. § 1252(g).
The Attorney General moved to dismiss the suit for lack of jurisdiction under the new statute, but the District Court denied the motion.
The Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed the District Court's denial of the motion to dismiss, holding that it retained jurisdiction.
The U.S. Supreme Court granted the Attorney General's petition for a writ of certiorari.

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Issue:

Does 8 U.S.C. § 1252(g) deprive federal courts of jurisdiction over a lawsuit challenging the Attorney General’s decision to commence deportation proceedings against a group of aliens based on an alleged claim of selective enforcement for their political affiliations?

Opinions:

Majority - Justice Scalia

Yes. 8 U.S.C. § 1252(g) deprives federal courts of jurisdiction over this claim. The statute's jurisdictional bar is narrow, applying only to three discrete actions by the Attorney General: the 'decision or action' to 'commence proceedings, adjudicate cases, or execute removal orders.' The respondents' lawsuit, which challenges the Attorney General's decision to initiate deportation proceedings against them on selective enforcement grounds, falls squarely within the first of these enumerated actions—the decision to 'commence proceedings.' This narrow interpretation resolves a potential conflict in the statute's transitional rules and serves Congress's intent to protect the Executive's prosecutorial discretion in immigration matters from piecemeal judicial intervention. Furthermore, as a general matter, an alien unlawfully present in the U.S. has no constitutional right to assert selective enforcement as a defense against deportation, as the government's interests in this context are exceptionally high and deportation is not considered a criminal punishment.

Concurring - Justice Ginsburg

Yes. While § 1252(g) bars this pre-final-order lawsuit, it does not necessarily preclude all review of the respondents' constitutional claim. The First Amendment does not require immediate judicial intervention in administrative proceedings of this type, absent extraordinary circumstances like bad faith or blatantly lawless action, which are not present here. Congress established an integrated scheme channeling judicial review to the final removal order. The opportunity to raise the selective enforcement claim during judicial review of a final order is constitutionally sufficient, especially given the Attorney General's representation that a court of appeals could transfer the case to a district court for necessary fact-finding at that stage.

Concurring - Justice Stevens

Yes. The statutory text contains a scrivener's error, and if the word 'section' in § 1252(g) were read as 'Act,' Congress's intent would be clear. Congress intended to immediately prohibit collateral attacks on ongoing INS proceedings while allowing those pending administrative cases to be completed under the old scheme of judicial review for final orders. While I agree with the dissent that § 1252(g) applies broadly to the entire removal proceeding, I do not share its constitutional doubts, as the Attorney General may permissibly give priority to removing deportable aliens who are members of terrorist-supporting organizations.

Dissenting - Justice Souter

No. The transitional provisions of the IIRIRA are irreconcilably contradictory, with one section (§ 306(c)(1)) appearing to strip all judicial review for pending cases and another (§ 309(c)(1)) appearing to preserve it. The majority's narrow interpretation of § 1252(g) parses the language 'too finely'; the enumerated actions should be read inclusively to cover the entire deportation process. Faced with a statutory contradiction that threatens to completely preclude review of a constitutional claim, the principle of constitutional doubt requires adopting the interpretation that avoids this serious question. Therefore, the provision preserving judicial review should prevail, and under the pre-IIRIRA legal framework, the district court had jurisdiction over this claim.

Analysis:

This decision significantly shapes the landscape of judicial review in immigration law by narrowly interpreting the jurisdiction-stripping provision of 8 U.S.C. § 1252(g). By holding that the bar applies only to three specific discretionary actions, the Court prevented the statute from becoming a complete ban on all pre-final order litigation. However, the ruling effectively insulates the Executive's core prosecutorial decisions in immigration from early judicial scrutiny, forcing constitutional claims like selective enforcement to be raised only upon review of a final deportation order. The case reinforces judicial deference to the executive branch in immigration matters, particularly those touching on national security, and establishes that such claims face a high substantive bar.

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