Joel Judulang, Petitioner v. Eric H. Holder, JR., Attorney General (565 U.S. 42)
U.S. Supreme Court · decided December 12, 2011 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Citation
- 565 U.S. 42 · 132 S. Ct. 476
- Decided
- December 12, 2011
- Term
- October Term 2011
- Vote
- 9–0
- Majority author
- Justice Kagan
- Issue area
- Civil Rights
- Disposition
- Reversed and remanded
- Outcome
- Petitioning party won
- Ideological direction
- Liberal
Opinion excerpt
Justice Kagan delivered the opinion of the Court. This case concerns the Board of Immigration Appeals’ (BIA or Board) policy for deciding when resident aliens may apply to the Attorney General for relief from deportation under a now-repealed provision of the immigration laws. We hold that the BIA’s approach is arbitrary and capricious. The legal background of this case is complex, but the principle guiding our decision is anything but. When an administrative agency sets policy, it must provide a reasoned explanation for its action. That is not a high bar, but it is an unwavering one. Here, the BIA has failed to meet it. I A Federal immigration law governs both the exclusion of aliens from admission to this country and the deportation of aliens previously admitted. Before 1996, these two kinds of action occurred in different procedural settings, with an alien seeking entry (whether for the first time or upon return from a trip abroad) placed in an “exclusion proceeding” and an alien already here channeled to a “deportation proceeding.” See Landon v. Plasencia, 459 U. S. 21, 25-26 (1982) (comparing the two). Since that time, the Government has used a unified procedure, known as a “removal proceeding,” for exclusions and deportations alike. See 8 U. S. C. §§ 1229, 1229a. But the statutory bases for excluding and deporting aliens have always varied. Now, as before, the…
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