Thread by @kit_johnson

"If men must turn square corners when they deal with the government, it cannot be too much to expect the government to turn square corners when it deals with them." Justice Gorsuch for #SCOTUS in Niz-Chavez v. Garland today. supremecourt.gov/opinions/20pdf… a 🧵

In June 2018, SCOTUS issued an opinion (8-1) in Pereira v. Sessions concerning the document that begins #removal (aka #deportation) proceedings against #noncitizens: the Notice to Appear or #NTA

In Pereira, Justice Sotomayor (writing for the 8-strong majority) said that an #NTA that didn't include a time or place listed for the removal proceedings was not a valid notice to appear. (The gov't typically issued NTAs staying "TBD" for time and place.)

The big Pereira Qn was: Does an NTA w/o time/place "stop time." That is, noncitizen are eligible for deportation relief called cancellation of removal if they've been continuously present in the US for 10 or more years. Those years accumulate until time is stopped by a valid NTA

In Pereira, SCOTUS said that the NTA w/o time/place did NOT "stop time" for purposes of the applicable form of relief.

"[a] notice that does not inform a noncitizen when and where to appear for removal proceedings is not a ‘notice to appear under section 1229(a)." Pereira.

(Sidenote: I saw Pereira as challenging immigration courts' subject matter jurisdiction in cases begun with invalid NTAs papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cf…)

Anyhoo... in Niz-Chavez considered something else. Following Pereira, the gov't decided to start issuing two documents: A @DHSgov entity (typically USBP) would issue an #NTA w/o a time or date . Later, the @DOJ_EOIR would send a Notice of Hearing with the time and date info.

The BIA found this two-step process entirely hunky dory in its post-Pereira decision Bermudez-Cota.

Niz-Chavez v. Barr (as originally filed) was about whether this two-step process complied with Pereira.

Oral argument in November was a pip. lawprofessors.typepad.com/immigration/20…

Justice Gorsuch was 🔥 saying: "It sure seems a little bit like Pereira groundhog day to me" and questioning "why the government is pursing this at all given Pereira"

So it's no surprise to me that Gorsuch is the author of the Niz Chavez decision today supremecourt.gov/opinions/20pdf…

Gorsuch's introduction is powerful. He talks about the gov'ts affinity for forms and the lack of grace for form-fillers "Make a mistake or skip a page? Go back and try again, sometimes with a penalty for the trouble."

Yet what the gov't wanted in Niz-Chavez was the grace it denies to the rest of us -- to be allowed to go outside of what the statute requires and take an easier route. To not provide all the information required in one document but to roll that info out over time in multiple docs

"The government says it needs this kind of flexibility to send information piecemeal. It even suggests it should be allowed to spread the statutorily man- dated information over as many documents and as much time as it wishes."

Yet "§1229(a)(1) explains that “written notice (in this section referred to as a ‘notice to appear’) shall be given . . . to the alien . . . specifying” the time and place of his hearing and all the other items we noted above."

A notice to appear. "A"

NOT, as the gov't would have it, as many documents as it would like... but a singular document... A notice to appear.

"Admittedly, a lot here turns on a small word."

"To build on an illustration we used in Pereira, someone who agrees to buy “a car” would hardly expect to receive the chassis today, wheels next week, and an engine to follow."

Other contextual clues support this interpretation, Gorsuch writes.

Look at "statutory structure and history" of #IIRIRA

While "Ultimately, the government is forced to abandon any pre- tense of interpreting the statute’s terms and retreat to policy arguments and pleas for deference." Those do not sway #SCOTUS

"If the government finds filling out forms a chore, it has good company. The world is awash in forms, and rarely do agencies afford individuals the same latitude in completing them that the government seeks for itself today."

The gov't wants the freedom to send multiple letters -- over "weeks, months, maybe years, each containing a new morsel of vital information. All of which the individual alien would have to save and compile in order to prepare for a removal hearing."

They cannot. "when the federal government seeks a procedural advantage against an individual, it will at least supply him with a single and reasonably comprehensive statement of the nature of the proceedings against him."

And so this 🧵 ends where it began: "If men must turn square corners when they deal with the government, it cannot be too much to expect the government to turn square corners when it deals with them." Niz-Chavez. #SCOTUS