Patel v. Garland
The Court ruled 5-4 that federal courts cannot review factual findings underlying immigration agencies' denials of discretionary relief like green cards — even when the agency may have made an obvious factual error.
The decision resolves a longstanding disagreement among federal courts and leaves immigrants denied green cards with no way to ask a federal court to correct potentially wrong agency factual conclusions.
“Federal courts lack jurisdiction to review facts found as part of discretionary-relief proceedings under §1255 and the other provisions enumerated in §1252(a)(2)(B)(i).”
The majority's concise statement of its holding on the scope of the immigration court-stripping provision.
How it got here: An Immigration Judge denied Patel's green card application and ordered removal; the Board of Immigration Appeals dismissed his appeal; the Eleventh Circuit, sitting en banc, held it lacked jurisdiction; the Supreme Court agreed to hear the case to resolve a circuit conflict.
The Case in Depth
What happened
Pankajkumar Patel and his wife entered the United States illegally in the 1990s. In 2007 Patel applied for a green card. While that application was pending, he checked a box on a Georgia driver's license form falsely stating he was a U.S. citizen. He maintained it was an accident, but the immigration agency concluded he had lied intentionally, making him ineligible. When removal proceedings began, Patel sought a green card again, and an Immigration Judge again disbelieved his explanation and ordered the couple removed.
The question before the Court
Can federal courts review the factual findings immigration agencies relied on when denying someone's application for a green card or other discretionary relief from removal?
The Court's answer
No — federal courts cannot review factual findings made during the process of deciding whether to grant discretionary immigration relief, such as a green card. A federal statute bars judicial review of "any judgment regarding the granting of relief" under adjustment-of-status and related immigration laws. The Court read that phrase broadly: "any judgment" covers all decisions — including factual findings like whether a person lied on a form or testified credibly — that relate to the granting of relief, not just the final grant-or-deny decision.
Congress reinforced this reading when it separately preserved judicial review only for legal and constitutional questions, pointedly leaving factual questions out. An immigrant who believes an agency got the facts wrong — even badly wrong — cannot take that dispute to a federal court. Only if the error also involves a legal or constitutional claim does federal court review remain available.
Curious how the Court got there? See the step-by-step legal reasoning →
Why it matters
Immigrants whose green card or other discretionary-relief applications are denied by immigration agencies cannot ask federal courts to correct factual errors in those decisions — only legal or constitutional challenges remain open. The ruling may also leave people denied outside removal proceedings with no judicial recourse at all, though the Court expressly reserved that question for another day.
What changes now
The Patels face removal from the United States, with no avenue to challenge the factual finding that Patel intentionally misrepresented his citizenship. Going forward, immigration agencies' factual conclusions in discretionary-relief proceedings are final — federal courts cannot correct them. The Court left open whether its ruling also forecloses judicial review for people denied green cards entirely outside removal proceedings, meaning that question will be contested in lower courts.
What this does not decide
The Court explicitly did not decide whether USCIS denials of green card applications made before removal proceedings begin are also shielded from all judicial review — including legal and constitutional challenges. The opinion also does not address what "discretionary judgment" means in other immigration provisions that use that specific phrase.
Concurrences and dissents
Dissent — Justice Gorsuch
Justice Gorsuch argued that §1252(a)(2)(B)(i) bars review only of the second-step discretionary decision whether to grant relief — not first-step factual findings about whether an applicant is eligible. In his reading, 'regarding the granting of relief' narrows rather than broadens the bar, focusing it on the purely discretionary act of granting or denying relief. He warned that the majority's reading would strip all judicial review from thousands of green-card applicants denied outside removal proceedings, leaving agency errors — factual, legal, or constitutional — beyond any court's reach.
How the Court got there
The legal reasoning, step by step
- The central interpretive question was the scope of 8 U.S.C. §1252(a)(2)(B)(i), which strips federal courts of jurisdiction to review 'any judgment regarding the granting of relief' under adjustment-of-status and related immigration laws. Three competing readings were before the Court: a broad reading (any authoritative decision), the government's mid-range reading (only discretionary decisions), and Patel's narrow reading (only the final up-or-down grant decision).
- The Court adopted the broadest reading. The word 'any' carries an expansive meaning — 'of whatever kind' — so the bar covers all judgments under the enumerated provisions, not just discretionary ones or the last-in-time one. The word 'regarding' similarly broadens the scope beyond the final grant-or-deny decision to all decisions relating to the granting of relief, which plainly includes factual findings.
- Congress's later addition of §1252(a)(2)(D) — which restored judicial review only for constitutional claims and legal questions, but said nothing about factual questions — reinforced this reading. If factual review had always been available, Congress would have had no reason to carve out only legal and constitutional claims. The major remaining category that subparagraph (D) implicitly left unreviewable was therefore questions of fact.
- The Court rejected the government's argument that 'judgment' means only a discretionary decision. When Congress wanted to limit jurisdiction-stripping language to discretionary decisions, it said so — other immigration provisions use the phrase 'discretionary judgment' explicitly. The absence of that word in §1252(a)(2)(B)(i) undermined the government's attempt to read discretion into the statute.
- The Court also rejected Patel's narrower reading — that only the ultimate grant-or-deny decision is covered — because that reading would make the word 'regarding' meaningless. The statute already says 'the granting of relief'; the word 'regarding' must expand the scope beyond just that final decision, not simply restate it.
- The Court dismissed the argument that its interpretation creates arbitrary anomalies — for example, that the same factual question might be reviewable in a straight removal case but not in a discretionary-relief proceeding. That disparity simply reflects Congress's deliberate choice to afford reduced procedural protection to discretionary relief; policy concerns cannot override the text's plain meaning.
Doctrinal impact
Cases affected by this decision
Reaffirms Guerrero-Lasprilla v. Barr (589 U. S. ___)
The Court reaffirmed its prior signal that factual review is unavailable under jurisdiction-stripping immigration provisions.
Reaffirms Nasrallah v. Barr (590 U. S. ___)
The Court adhered to Nasrallah's observation that noncitizens may not bring factual challenges to orders denying discretionary relief.
Distinguishes Kucana v. Holder (558 U. S. 233)
The Court found Kucana inapposite because it addressed only whether the Attorney General could self-designate decisions as discretionary, not whether factual findings in eligibility proceedings are reviewable.