Riley v. Bondi
The Supreme Court ruled that for immigrants in expedited deportation proceedings, the 30-day clock to file a federal court appeal begins the instant the initial deportation order issues — not after later proceedings over protection from torture conclude, even if those proceedings take months or years.
The Court also ruled unanimously that the 30-day deadline is a flexible rule the government can choose not to enforce, not a hard limit on courts' authority — meaning a late-filed petition can still proceed if the government agrees to let it.
“the statutory text and our precedents make clear that the FARO is the final order of removal in this case, and withholding-only proceedings do not disturb the finality of an otherwise final order of removal.”
The majority's core holding that the original deportation order — not any later torture-protection ruling — triggers the appeal deadline.
How it got here: The Fourth Circuit dismissed Riley's petition for review as untimely and jurisdictionally barred; the Supreme Court granted certiorari to resolve two splits among the federal courts of appeals.
The Case in Depth
What happened
Pierre Riley, a Jamaican citizen convicted of drug trafficking in the United States, was subject to expedited deportation after his release from prison in 2021. He didn't dispute being deported but feared a powerful Jamaican drug kingpin — who had already killed two of his cousins — would torture or kill him if he returned to Jamaica. An immigration judge agreed and blocked his removal under the Convention Against Torture, but the Board of Immigration Appeals reversed that decision 16 months after Riley's original deportation order had been issued.
The question before the Court
Does the 30-day deadline for a deported immigrant to file a federal court appeal start the moment the initial deportation order issues — even if separate proceedings over whether the person faces torture in their home country haven't finished — and is missing that deadline an absolute bar to going to court?
The Court's answer
On the first question, No — the "final order of removal" that starts the 30-day clock was the original deportation order issued by the Department of Homeland Security in January 2021, not the Board of Immigration Appeals' ruling on Riley's torture-protection claim over a year later. Under the statute, a "final order of removal" must be one that concludes the person is deportable and directs their removal. A ruling on a Convention Against Torture claim does neither — it only determines whether a person can be sent to a particular country, without disturbing the deportation order itself. Since Riley in expedited proceedings had no avenue to appeal the deportation order to the Board, that order became final the moment it was issued.
On the second question, the 30-day deadline is not an absolute limit on courts' power to hear a case — it is a procedural rule that the government can waive. Congress gave no clear signal in the statute that this deadline should strip courts of all authority when missed. Because the government chose not to invoke the untimeliness argument here, the Fourth Circuit's dismissal was undone and the case returns for further proceedings — though whether the Fourth Circuit can actually hear Riley's appeal at all remains an open question.
Curious how the Court got there? See the step-by-step legal reasoning →
Why it matters
Immigrants facing expedited deportation who also claim protection under the Convention Against Torture now face a difficult bind: they must file a federal court appeal within 30 days of their initial deportation order, even if their torture-protection case won't be decided for many more months. Those who wait until after the torture-protection ruling — the intuitive choice — may lose any right to judicial review unless the government voluntarily decides not to raise the timing issue.
What changes now
The case returns to the Fourth Circuit, which must first ask whether it has jurisdiction to review Riley's Convention Against Torture claim at all — Justice Thomas's concurrence flags that courts may only review CAT claims "as part of the review of a final order of removal," and Riley only petitioned for review of the Board's CAT ruling, never of his underlying deportation order. If the Fourth Circuit finds it has jurisdiction, it will then consider whether the Board was right to reverse the immigration judge's grant of torture protection.
What this does not decide
The ruling does not decide whether Riley's appeal can actually proceed on the merits — a separate jurisdictional question flagged by Justice Thomas (whether courts can review a CAT order in isolation when the petitioner never sought review of the underlying deportation order) remains open on remand. The decision also does not address whether equitable tolling could rescue late-filed petitions in future cases.
Concurrences and dissents
Concurrence — Justice Thomas
Justice Thomas agreed with the full majority opinion and joined it, but wrote separately to flag a different jurisdictional problem the Fourth Circuit must confront on remand. Because Riley only petitioned for review of the Board's CAT order — and never sought review of the underlying deportation order — a separate federal statute (the Foreign Affairs Reform and Restructuring Act) may bar courts from reviewing a CAT order in isolation. He urged the Fourth Circuit to consider whether it has jurisdiction to hear Riley's appeal at all.
Dissent in part — Justice Sotomayor
“The answer is clear: One should not be required to appeal an order before it exists.”The dissent's opening salvo against a rule it called absurd — requiring Riley to appeal a Board order 16 months before it was issued.
Justice Sotomayor agreed with the majority that the 30-day deadline is not jurisdictional (joining Part II-B), but dissented sharply from the holding that the initial deportation order was final before torture-protection proceedings concluded. She argued that centuries of appellate finality doctrine require that orders which must be appealed together also become final together — and since Congress directed that CAT claims be appealed as part of the same petition as the removal order, Riley's deportation order could not become final for appeal purposes until the Board issued its CAT ruling. She called the majority's result 'absurd,' warning it forces immigrants to file premature protective appeals years before any CAT ruling, benefiting no one — not immigrants, the government, or the courts.
How the Court got there
The legal reasoning, step by step
- The statute defines a qualifying 'order of removal' as one 'concluding that the alien is deportable or ordering deportation.' The January 2021 administrative order (called a FARO) met that definition: it held Riley deportable and commanded his removal. The Board of Immigration Appeals' later order denying Convention Against Torture protection did not conclude he was deportable or order his removal, so it could not be the 'final order of removal' that starts the 30-day clock.
- For immigrants in expedited removal proceedings — those convicted of aggravated felonies — there is no appeal of the removal order to the Board of Immigration Appeals. The statute says a removal order becomes final at the earlier of: (a) a Board affirmation, or (b) expiration of the period to seek Board review. Because Riley had no period to seek Board review of his deportation order, that period 'expired' immediately on issuance, making the order final the moment DHS issued it.
- Two prior Supreme Court decisions reinforce this conclusion. Nasrallah v. Barr (2020) held that Convention Against Torture rulings are not final orders of removal because they don't conclude the person is deportable and don't disturb or affect the validity of the underlying removal order. Johnson v. Guzman Chavez (2021) held that removal orders are administratively final regardless of ongoing torture-protection proceedings — 'the finality of the order of removal does not depend in any way on the outcome of the withholding-only proceedings.'
- On whether the 30-day rule is 'jurisdictional' — meaning a limit on courts' power that can never be waived — the Court applied a demanding clear-statement test established in Arbaugh v. Y & H Corp. (2006): courts treat a rule as jurisdictional only if Congress explicitly says so. Section 1252(b)(1)'s language directs immigrants what to do but gives no commands to courts, never mentions jurisdiction, and is not located in the parts of the statute that define or limit courts' review authority.
- Stone v. INS (1995), which had called a predecessor provision's filing deadline 'jurisdictional,' used that term loosely and predated the Court's current discipline about the distinction between true court-power limits and merely mandatory procedural rules. Subsequent rulings — Henderson, Boechler, Harrow — have repeatedly found similar filing deadlines non-jurisdictional, confirming Stone was not the kind of 'definitive earlier interpretation' that would lock in jurisdictional status. Because the government declined to seek dismissal on untimeliness grounds, the case proceeds on remand despite Riley having filed long after the true 30-day window closed.
Doctrinal impact
Cases affected by this decision
Reaffirms Nasrallah v. Barr (590 U.S. 573)
Confirmed that CAT orders are not final orders of removal and do not disturb removal orders' finality.
Reaffirms Johnson v. Guzman Chavez (594 U.S. 523)
Confirmed that removal order finality does not depend on the outcome of withholding-only proceedings.
Limits Stone v. INS (514 U.S. 386)
Stone's loose use of 'jurisdictional' for a filing deadline was not a definitive interpretation warranting continued adherence.
Reaffirms Arbaugh v. Y & H Corp. (546 U.S. 500)
Reaffirmed that courts treat filing deadlines as jurisdictional only if Congress clearly states that intent.