by Robert Barnes
April 17 at 2:23 PM - The Washington Post
A divided Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that part of a federal law used to deport noncitizens who commit felonies is unconstitutionally vague, with new Justice Neil M. Gorsuch joining the courtfs liberal members in striking the statute.
The 5-to-4 decision could limit the governmentfs ability to deport those with criminal records, something that President Trump has identified as a priority.
Justice Elena Kagan wrote that the part of the Immigration and Nationality Act in question was so gfuzzyh over what constitutes the kind of aggravated felony that requires an immigrantfs deportation that it violated the constitutional protection of due process.
She was joined by the courtfs consistent liberals — Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen G. Breyer and Sonia Sotomayor — as well as Gorsuch, who has just celebrated his first anniversary on the court after being nominated by Trump.
Gorsuch did not join all of Kaganfs opinion, but he agreed with the outcome.
gVague laws invite arbitrary power,h Gorsuch wrote in concurring with the majority. He mentioned that before the American Revolution, the crime of treason in English law gave authorities power to go after those whose opinions they disliked.
gTodayfs vague laws may not be as invidious, but they can invite the exercise of arbitrary power all the same — by leaving the people in the dark about what the law demands and allowing prosecutors and courts to make it up,h he wrote.
For the conservative Gorsuch to align with the liberals might seem a surprise, but his vote was in keeping with questions he asked during oral argument in October. And he was in part following in the footsteps of the justice he replaced, the late Antonin Scalia.
In 2015, Scalia wrote the courtfs decision in Johnson v. United States, which struck down a similarly vague description of violent felony in the Armed Career Criminal Act.
The same standards held, Kagan wrote: gJohnson is a straightforward decision, with equally straightforward application here.h
The present case was brought by James Garcia Dimaya, a citizen of the Philippines admitted to the United States as a lawful permanent resident in 1992, when he was 13.
In 2007 and 2009, he was convicted of residential burglary. The Department of Homeland Security determined that his crimes could be considered crimes of violence and thus were aggravated felonies that made him eligible for deportation.
But after the Johnson decision, lawyers for those slated for deportation challenged a catchall provision of the immigration law. It defined as crimes of violence offenses that involve ga substantial risk that physical force against the person or property of another may be used in the course of committing the offense.h
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit said that deciding whether Dimayafs burglaries fit that description required the kind of speculation that Scaliafs ruling in Johnson said was improper.
gThe Supreme Court delivered a resounding message today: You canft banish a person from his home and family without clear lines, announced up front,h said Dimayafs lawyer in the case, Josh Rosenkranz. gThis decision is of enormous consequence, striking down a flawed law that applies in a vast range of criminal and immigration cases and which has resulted in many thousands of immigrants being deported for decades in violation of their due process rights.h
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. wrote in dissent that the court was careful to be narrow in the Johnson decision and that it does not compel striking down a separate law.
gTodayfs holding invalidates a provision of the Immigration and Nationality Act . . . on which the government relies to eensure that dangerous criminal aliens are removed from the United States,f h Roberts wrote, quoting a brief from the solicitor general. He noted that the government deemed the definition gcriticalh for numerous immigration provisions.
The Obama administration had interpreted the law in the same way as the current administration.
Roberts was joined by Justices Anthony M. Kennedy, Clarence Thomas and Samuel A. Alito Jr.
The lineup of justices in the case produced what is believed to be a first: the chance for Ginsburg to choose who would write the courtfs opinion.
Under the courtfs rules, the chief justice decides who writes the opinion when he is in the majority. If he is not, the choice is made by the longest-serving justice in the majority. Although the liberal Ginsburg has been on the court for almost 25 years, this is the first time she has been in that senior position.
The case is Sessions v. Dimaya.