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January 19, 2016

The Supreme Court Adds ‘Take Care Clause’ to the DAPA Debate

Cross-posted from ACSblog.

The Supreme Court granted certiorari in United States v. Texas today, agreeing to hear the federal government's questions on its immigration policy and adding one more. The Court will decide whether the federal government's policy to postpone the deportations of millions who are in the United States in undocumented status is arbitrary and capricious, whether it was subject to the APA's notice and comment procedures, and whether the states have standing to sue. The Court added a question that was not decided in the lower courts, namely, whether the policy violates the Take Care Clause in Art. II, Sec. 3, which requires the president to take care that the laws of the United States are faithfully executed.

At issue in this case is the president's announcement of a guidance that would defer action on the undocumented noncitizens in the United States who have lived in the United States for five years and who came as children, or who have U.S. citizen or permanent resident children. The federal government claims that the president's guidance is permitted under immigration law, which allows the Department of Homeland Security to postpone, for its own convenience or for humanitarian reasons, the removal of noncitizens from the United States. The immigration statute also allows the Department of Homeland Security, for its own convenience, to issue employment authorization to these individuals. Notably, deferred action does not bestow any form of legal status on noncitizens, nor does it provide any benefit.

The most interesting part of the Court's grant is its signal that it will decide whether the president's guidance violates the Constitution's Take Care Clause. The questions of whether the president has faithfully executed the laws of the United States requires a deep understanding of the multi-dimensional nature of the immigration law at stake.

Immigration law has historically included both enforcement and humanitarian aspects. While the enforcement provisions give the executive branch wide latitude in determining whether individuals are removable, the humanitarian provisions also give the executive branch great latitude in determining whether removal is warranted given an individual's circumstances. By providing guidance on deferral of removal in a set of cases that warrant the executive branch's discretion - discretion delegated by Congress - the president has fulfilled his duties under the Clause.

If the Supreme Court accepts the multi-dimensionality of immigration law, it will find that the executive branch has done exactly what the Take Care Clause requires: It has created a guidance that reflects the multi-dimensional aspects of immigration law while maintaining its duty to stay within the contours of existing law.