Immigration Law Commons^™

Kim Ho Ma V. Reno: Cloaking Judicial Activism As Constitutional Avoidance, Matthew E. Hedberg

Washington Law Review

In Kim Ho Ma v. Reno, the Ninth Circuit rewrote the plain language of § 241(a)(6) of the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 (IIRIRA) to avoid a constitutional defect in the statute. Section 123 1(a)(6) of Title 8 of the U.S. Code, which codifies § 241(a)(6) of the IIRIRA, authorizes the Attorney General to detain criminal aliens, or removable aliens posing a danger to the community or a danger of flight risk, beyond the statutory removal period if they have not been removed from the country. Under the guise of constitutional avoidance, the Ma court …