SCOTUSblog by Jayesh Rathod 11/6/2019
On Monday morning, the Supreme Court heard oral argument in Barton v. Barr, a case that requires the justices to decipher the stop-time rule, an oddly worded provision in the Immigration and Nationality Act. Congress embedded this rule within the statute governing cancellation of removal, an important form of relief for noncitizens in removal proceedings. Lawful permanent residents seeking cancellation of removal must demonstrate, among other things, seven years of continuous residence in the United States. The stop-time rule complicates that calculation by laying out occurrences that freeze the seven-year clock. Under the rule, the clock will stop
when the alien has committed an offense referred to in section 1182(a)(2) of this title that renders the alien inadmissible to the United States under section 1182(a)(2) of this title or removable from the United States under section 1227(a)(2) or 1227(a)(4) of this title.
The wording of the stop-time rule implicates a core distinction in immigration law between inadmissibility (lack of fitness to be admitted to the United States) and deportability (susceptibility to expulsion following a lawful admission). In Barton, the justices must determine whether a past crime can “render[] … inadmissible†a lawfully admitted permanent resident who is not actually seeking admission to the United States. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit said yes, reasoning that inadmissibility is a type of status that transcends the specific procedural posture of a case. After an hour of oral argument, the justices seemed to agree on only one thing: The stop-time rule is inartfully written. In the colorful words of Justice Stephen Breyer, “
t wasn’t a genius who drafted this.â€
Attorney Adam Unikowsky, representing petitioner Andre Martello Barton, argued that the language of the stop-time rule presumes an actual adjudication of inadmissibility or deportability in the proceeding in which the rule is invoked. In other words, a crime “renders the alien inadmissible†and forecloses relief only if an immigration judge found the noncitizen to be inadmissible in the first phase of proceedings. To bolster his interpretation, Unikowsky highlighted two neighboring INA provisions: Section 1226, which relates to mandatory detention, and Section 1252, addressing appellate jurisdiction over immigration cases. In both provisions, the term “inadmissible†references an actual determination made in the noncitizen’s removal proceeding.
More: https://www.scotusblog.com/2019/11/argument-analysis-justices-examine-structure-and-purpose-of-puzzling-immigration-statute/
