Term: 2011
Docket: 10-694
Joel Judulang, Petitioner v. Eric H. Holder, Jr., Attorney General
- Pro
10-694 JUDULANG V. HOLDER DECISION BELOW: 249 Fed. Appx 499 CERT. GRANTED 4/18/2011 QUESTION PRESENTED: For more than 25 years, the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) held that a legal permanent resident (LPR) who is deportable due to a criminal conviction could seek a discretionary waiver of removal under Section 212(c) of the Immigration and Nationality Act, 8 U.S.C. §1182(c), provided that the conviction also would have constituted a waivable basis for exclusion. In 2005, the BIA abruptly changed course, adding a requirement that the LPR be deportable under a statutory provision that used "similar language" to an exclusion provision. Deportable LPRs who departed and reentered the United States after their conviction, however, may seek Section 212(c) relief under a longstanding "nunc pro tunc" procedure that does not turn on similar language between deportation and exclusion provisions. Thus, under the BIA's current view, an LPR who pled guilty to an offense that renders him both deportable and excludable, but under provisions that use dissimilar phrasing, will be eligible for Section 212(c) relief from deportation if he departed and reentered the United States after his conviction, but ineligible if he did not depart. The circuits are split three ways on the lawfulness of the BIA's new interpretation. The question presented is: Whether a lawful permanent resident who was convicted by guilty plea of an offense that renders him deportable and excludable under differently phrased statutory subsections, but who did not depart and reenter the United States between his conviction and the commencement of removal proceedings, is categorically foreclosed from seeking discretionary relief from removal under former Section 212(c) of the INA. LOWER COURT CASE NUMBER: 06-70986
In the 2011 case of Joel Judulang v. Eric H. Holder, Jr., Attorney General, the U.S Supreme Court ruled in favor of Judulang by a unanimous decision. The case revolved around an immigration law issue where Joel Judulang, a legal permanent resident from Philippines who had been living in the United States since childhood was ordered to be deported due to his involvement in voluntary manslaughter and other crimes during his youth. The Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) denied him relief under Section 212(c) waiver which allowed certain long-term residents convicted on criminal charges to avoid deportation if they could demonstrate that their removal would cause "extreme hardship". BIA argued that this provision only applied when the grounds for deportation were analogous to grounds for exclusion - something not applicable here as he was charged with crime involving moral turpitude rather than possession of firearm used earlier as basis for exclusion proceedings against him. The Supreme Court held that BIA's policy approach was arbitrary and capricious under Administrative Procedure Act because it did not align with purposes of Immigration and Nationality Act or section 212(c). It also noted that such interpretation led to disparate treatment based on irrelevant factors like type or timing of removal proceedings instead focusing on individual circumstances warranting relief from deportation.
In the dissenting opinion for Joel Judulang v. Eric H. Holder, Jr., Justice Scalia argued that the majority's decision was an overreach of judicial power and a misinterpretation of immigration law. He contended that the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) had not acted arbitrarily or capriciously in its application of Section 212(c) relief to deportation cases, but rather followed a consistent policy based on statutory interpretation and precedent. According to Scalia, it is within BIA’s authority to interpret ambiguous statutes such as this one; therefore, courts should defer to their expertise unless they have clearly violated legislative intent or constitutional rights – which he did not believe happened in this case.
