United States v. Sineneng-Smith (19-67)

argument 19-67

United States v. Sineneng-Smith

Supreme Court of the United States 58 min 6 speakers 8 chapters transcribed 6 days ago official recording ↗

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What is the legal definition of “encourage” and “induce” under the immigration statute?

John G. Roberts 0:01

We'll hear argument this morning, case nineteen sixty seven, United States v versus Sonening Smith. Mr Fagan?

Unknown 0:08

Thank you, Mr Chief Justice, and may it please the court. Respondent acknowledges that in the context of a criminal law, the terms encourage and induce can refer solely to acts that facilitate or solicit unlawful activity. That's the meaning that they have in the context of this criminal law. There's no reason to reach out and give them a vastly more expansive interpretation simply to strike the statute down. Prohibitions on facilitating or soliciting unlawful activity have existed since before the founding and are perfectly constitutional. Interpreting this law to be unconstitutionally overbroad would deviate from that tradition and directly contradict the canon of constitutional avoidance. Historical understanding and practice confirm that Congress didn't use these familiar criminal law terms to enact a novel and broad ban on speech.

Unknown 0:59

Predecessors to this statute have been on the books since the late nineteenth century, and this provision has existed in substantially its current form for decades. Yet respondent and her Miki have identified no actual instances in which the statute has been applied to protected First Amendment activity or any concrete documented instances of chilling speech. The absence of such evidence isn't just happenstance and it doesn't just reflect long standing executive self restraint. It's because this statute isn't aimed at speech and it certainly doesn't encompass substantial amounts of it. To the extent that it could be applied to protected speech, that can be handled through the normal mechanism of as applied First Amendment challenges in those cases.

Unknown 1:43

This isn't such a case because respondents' own activity of fraudulently inducing aliens to pay her for a false path to lawful permanent residence isn't protected by the First Amendment. She is not entitled to the last resort remedy of overbreadth invalidation that the Ninth Circuit, on its own initiative, reached out to impose. That is particularly so because she was convicted of an offence that required the jury to find beyond a reasonable doubt that she acted for the purpose of financial gain.

John G. Roberts 2:15

You uh would acknowledge, though, that there are situations in which this would be unconstitutional as applied.

Unknown 2:23

Um Your Honor, I I suppose there might be some circumstances where this could be unconstitutional as a as applied. I don't know that anyone's identified any actual such applications that the statute would reach under our reading.

John G. Roberts 2:42

uh whose granddaughter is in the United States illegally, uh t tells the granddaughter, you know, I hope you will stay because, you know, I will miss you, things will not get better if you go back. So I encourage you to stay. That that I uh that would be uh illegal under the statute, right?

Unknown 3:01

It would not be illegal under the statute, Your Honor. And here's why. First of all, the issue of when uh Verbal acts or other acts cross the line into criminal complicity or solicitation is not a an issue unique to the statute. It's one that the criminal law has dealt with for centuries. And something that abstract and attenuated is not going to be criminal complicity. In particular, this statute we think covers a more narrow subset of criminal complicity and solicitation that really requires substantial participation in some uh unlawful venture or trying to gin up some unlawful venture with the goal that that unlawful venture actually occur. Um Turkish judge. Silid. I think it was the district court in Massachusetts.

Unknown 3:57

in which he said that that was an instance where the statute was applied to encroach on First Amendment. Right. So Your Honor, I don't uh I don't think Judge Toshima thought that that particular prosecution, which was not subject to a First Amendment challenge itself, was in violation of the First Amendment. Um I think which worried Judge Toshima was a colloquy that occurred during that case, in which a discussion was had about a hypothetical case in which, for example, the statute could in theory be applied to