Esquivel-Quintana v. Sessions (16-54)

argument 16-54

Esquivel-Quintana v. Sessions

Supreme Court of the United States 59 min 6 speakers 7 chapters transcribed 5 days ago official recording ↗

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What is the key statutory term at issue in Esquivel‑Quintana v. Sessions?

John G. Roberts 0:00

We'll hear argument next in case sixteen fifty four, Escobal Quintana versus Sessions. Mr Fisher. Mr Chief Justice, may it please

Unknown 0:10

the court. The key statutory term of the INA in this case is the word abuse. And the federal statute criminalizing sexual abuse of a minor, as well as the state statutes dealing with the same subject, dictate that sexual relations become abuse only on on account of age only when the younger p partner in the activity is younger than sixteen. At the very least, the Federal and State laws that I just mentioned dictate that California's statute is well outside of that which Congress would have expected.

Anthony M. Kennedy 0:43

I am sorry, Mr. Fisher. You just said something that I think you did not say in your briefs. So let me ask you about that. You just gave us your definition of what the generic offense is. It's under sixteen. Because I understood in your briefs you just said whatever the generic offense is, it doesn't include this activity. But do you have A definition of what the generic offense is? And if so, did you just say it?

Unknown 1:07

Mr. President, President, what we think is that if you want to give a definition for sexual abuse of a minor, at least in the context of uh the allegation of abuse being due to age, that sixteen would be the appropriate cutoff. And we do say that in our reply brief, in response to the government's point that at least its argument, that you need to go further than we argued in our blue brief.

Anthony M. Kennedy 1:29

D do you have any further uh views of what the generic offense is? Are there other elements of the generic offense that you're willing to tell us? You think I mean usually in these cases, first we define the generic offense and then we see whether the state statute in question fits within that or doesn't. And so what is the generic offense? It's under sixteen, anything else?

Unknown 1:52

Well there are four elements, Justice Kagan. Uh The word sex has to be sexual in nature, it has to be abuse, has to involve a minor, and then presumably there's some mens rea involved. I think those are four elements. And so what we think is enough to decide this case, in fact it's more than is necessary to decide this case, is to say when dealing with the element of abuse, and the allegation is solely because of the ages of the partners engaging in sexual relations, you have abuse, then 16 uh should be the age of consent. Now we didn't go that far in parts of our briefing because we don't think the court has to go that far. And Duanas Alvarez and other cases are examples where the court has said We'll just look at a particular element and say that as long as the state statute falls outside of that element, that's enough.

Unknown 2:36

So you could decide this case by saying that the seven states that have laws like California's at issue here that draw the age of consent at eighteen automatically fall outside of sexual abuse of a minor. And remember, even the seven states that have those laws, most of them are misdemeanors, and only one of those seven states calls that conduct abuse. Suppose y that there

Samuel A. Alito 2:57

were no uh that the definition here, uh the the the phrase here had no criminal application. So it applies purely in immigration, okay?

John G. Roberts 3:06

Uh-huh.

Samuel A. Alito 3:07

Um And you're not asking us to overrule Chevron.

Unknown 3:12

No,

John G. Roberts 3:12

no,

Unknown 3:13

no.

Samuel A. Alito 3:13

All right, so why wouldn't uh this phrase, uh sexual abuse of a minor be a phrase that is sufficiently ambiguous to justify uh Chevron. Now i in in order to get around that do you have to invoke something like the rule of lenity?

Unknown 3:31

No, we have other arguments, Justice Alito.

Samuel A. Alito 3:33

Uh so that that is not an ambiguous phrase by itself, sexual abuse of a minor?

Unknown 3:38

Not in the way you've defined ambiguity both in the categorical approach cases and for purposes of chevron. So let me turn to those one by one. in the categorical approach cases, starting with Taylor, When the court has confronted a generic crime without a specific cross-reference definition, what the court has done is look across the sweep of state laws and federal laws criminalizing that conduct. And in a case like Perrin, where there were 42 states that had a common core definition, the court explicitly said in a footnote in that case there's no ambiguity involved in that situation, because we assume it's sufficiently clear that that's what Congress would have.