What are the facts?
Angelo Judulang, a native of the Philippines, entered the United States as a child in the 1970s and became a lawful permanent resident. In 1989 he pleaded guilty in California state court to voluntary manslaughter and served a term of imprisonment. Years later, the Department of Homeland Security initiated removal proceedings based on that conviction, charging him as removable under 8 U.S.C. § 1227(a)(2)(A)(iii) as an aggravated felon because the offense constituted a crime of violence under 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(43)(F). Because Judulang's conviction predated the 1996 repeal of former § 212(c) of the INA, he sought to apply for a discretionary waiver of removal under that provision, consistent with INS v. St. Cyr, which preserved § 212(c) relief for LPRs who entered plea agreements before the repeal. The immigration judge, relying on BIA precedent (including Matter of Blake and Matter of Brieva), found Judulang ineligible because the charged ground of deportability—aggravated felony crime of violence—lacked a comparable ground of inadmissibility under § 212(a) for which § 212(c) historically applied. The BIA affirmed, and the Ninth Circuit denied Judulang's petition for review, upholding the BIA's comparable-grounds approach. The Supreme Court granted certiorari.
What is the legal issue?
Is the Board of Immigration Appeals' comparable-grounds (statutory counterpart) approach for determining a deportable lawful permanent resident's eligibility to seek a § 212(c) waiver arbitrary and capricious under the Administrative Procedure Act?
What rule applies?
Under the Administrative Procedure Act, a court shall set aside agency action that is arbitrary, capricious, an abuse of discretion, or otherwise not in accordance with law. An agency acts arbitrarily and capriciously if it relies on factors Congress did not intend it to consider, fails to consider an important aspect of the problem, offers an explanation contrary to the evidence, or adopts a rationale so implausible that it cannot be ascribed to a difference in view or agency expertise. Agency policies must be reasonable and reasonably explained, and they must be tied to the statutory text, structure, and purposes they purport to implement.
What did the court hold?
Yes. The BIA's comparable-grounds approach to § 212(c) eligibility is arbitrary and capricious because it makes eligibility turn on distinctions that have no bearing on the purposes of § 212(c) and produces irrational, happenstance-driven outcomes. The Court reversed and remanded.
What is the reasoning?
The Court began by situating § 212(c) historically: it was a discretionary waiver available to lawful permanent residents to avoid exclusion at the border (and, following Francis v. INS and agency practice, to avoid deportation) based on equitable considerations relating to the noncitizen's offense, rehabilitation, and ties to the United States. After Congress repealed § 212(c) in 1996, INS v. St. Cyr preserved access for LPRs who pleaded guilty before the repeal, reflecting reliance interests and the statute's longstanding remedial purpose. Against that backdrop, the BIA's comparable-grounds method conditioned eligibility in deportation cases on whether the specific charged deportation ground had a statutory counterpart in the inadmissibility provisions. If no such match existed, the alien could not even apply for relief—regardless of the nature of the underlying conviction or the equities in the individual case. The Supreme Court held that this methodology failed basic requirements of reasoned decisionmaking. First, the approach turns on a factor that is irrelevant to § 212(c)'s aims: a categorical alignment between lists of deportation and inadmissibility grounds that were drafted for different functions and do not neatly overlap. This structural mismatch causes materially identical offenders to receive disparate treatment based on the government's charging decision or the fortuity of travel outside the country. For example, an LPR convicted of an offense that would render him inadmissible could seek § 212(c) if returning from a trip abroad, yet the same person could be barred from seeking relief if charged in a deportation proceeding under a non-matching ground like aggravated felony crime of violence. Second, the BIA offered no persuasive justification linking its test to the text or purposes of § 212(c). The policy neither advanced the statute's equitable design nor rationally accounted for reliance interests preserved in St. Cyr. The Board's reliance on its historical practices did not cure the arbitrariness, because the earlier extension of § 212(c) to deportation cases (following Francis) was meant to avoid irrational disparities, not to create new ones. Nor could administrative convenience salvage the approach; administrative ease cannot justify a framework that produces outcomes akin to a sport of chance. In sum, the policy was not grounded in reasoned analysis connected to congressional intent, and thus violated the APA.
Why is this case significant?
Judulang is a leading example of the Supreme Court enforcing reasoned decisionmaking under the APA in the immigration arena. It rejects an eligibility screen that divorced relief from the statute's remedial purpose and from the alien's actual offense and equities. Practically, the decision ensured that St. Cyr's preservation of § 212(c) relief could not be gutted by an arbitrary gatekeeping device. Doctrinally, Judulang teaches that courts review agency policy choices for arbitrariness even when not couched as pure statutory interpretation, and that agencies must justify categorical rules with logic tied to statutory objectives. On remand from Judulang, the BIA eventually adopted a more offense-focused approach, culminating in Matter of Abdelghany (2014), which broadened access to § 212(c) for eligible LPRs with pre-1996 pleas.
What is § 212(c) relief and who could obtain it after its repeal?
Former § 212(c) allowed lawful permanent residents with at least seven years of lawful domicile to seek discretionary relief from exclusion (and, by agency practice after Francis v. INS, from deportation) despite certain criminal convictions. Although Congress repealed § 212(c) in 1996, INS v. St. Cyr held that LPRs who pleaded guilty before the repeal could still apply, recognizing their reliance on the availability of such relief when entering pleas.
What standard of review did the Supreme Court apply and why not Chevron deference?
The Court reviewed the BIA's policy under the APA's arbitrary-and-capricious standard. It did not engage in Chevron step analysis because the challenge was to the reasonableness of the agency's policy framework for administering § 212(c), not to an authoritative interpretation of ambiguous statutory text. Under the APA, the agency must show that its policy is reasonable, reasonably explained, and tethered to statutory purposes—requirements the comparable-grounds approach failed to meet.
Why did the Court find the comparable-grounds approach arbitrary?
Because it makes eligibility depend on the happenstance of how the government charges removability and on whether the deportation and inadmissibility lists happen to align—factors unrelated to § 212(c)'s equitable purpose. The approach created irrational disparities: two LPRs with the same conviction could be treated differently depending on whether one traveled abroad or on which deportation label DHS selected, even though their offenses and equities were the same.
Does Judulang itself grant § 212(c) relief to the petitioner?
No. Judulang invalidated the BIA's eligibility framework and remanded. It entitles applicants like Judulang to have their eligibility assessed under a lawful, reasoned standard, after which the agency may exercise its discretion on the merits. Following Judulang, the BIA adopted a more offense-focused approach, and in Matter of Abdelghany (2014) broadly recognized eligibility for many LPRs with pre-1996 pleas regardless of the specific charged deportation ground.
How does Judulang relate to INS v. St. Cyr?
St. Cyr preserved the availability of § 212(c) for certain LPRs with pre-1996 guilty pleas. Judulang ensures that agencies cannot undermine St. Cyr's protection through an arbitrary gatekeeping test that bars many such LPRs from even applying. Together, the cases safeguard both reliance interests and the equitable core of § 212(c).