Chaparro Navarro v. Department of Homeland Security

Background

Esthefany Chaparro Navarro and Manuel Morales Rodriguez brought claims under the Administrative Procedure Act and the federal mandamus statute. They sought to reverse USCIS’s revocation of Chaparro Navarro’s previously approved petition for U nonimmigrant status and USCIS’s resulting denial of Morales’s derivative petition.

Chaparro Navarro filed her U-status petition in December 2011, and USCIS approved it on October 1, 2012. She had been 14 when a man attempted to steal her purse and forcibly removed necklaces from her neck. She identified a suspect, cooperated with the investigation and prosecution, and later received diagnoses of depressive disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder. In April 2013, she filed a derivative petition for her father, Morales.

On September 16, 2014, nearly two years after approving Chaparro Navarro’s petition, USCIS issued a notice of intent to revoke it, stating that the approval had been made in error. USCIS later revoked the petition because the evidence did not show that Chaparro Navarro was a victim of felonious assault, and it denied Morales’s derivative petition. The Administrative Appeals Office upheld the revocation in decisions issued in 2016 and 2018. The 2018 decision also stated that the record did not establish substantial physical or mental abuse.

Arguments and legal standards

The plaintiffs argued that Congress had not authorized USCIS to revoke U nonimmigrant status and that the revocation regulation, 8 C.F.R. § 214.14(h)(2), was therefore beyond the agency’s authority. They also argued that, even if USCIS had authority to revoke status, the agency’s process was arbitrary and capricious. The plaintiffs expressly did not challenge the merits of USCIS’s conclusion about whether Chaparro Navarro’s experience qualified as the required criminal activity.

The defendants argued that DHS had authority under 8 U.S.C. §§ 1184(a)(1) and 1103(a)(3) to issue the revocation regulation and that USCIS properly revoked the approved petition. They also opposed mandamus relief on the ground that the revocation was lawful and supported by the administrative record.

The court reviewed the agency action under the Administrative Procedure Act. Under that law, a court may set aside agency action that is arbitrary and capricious, an abuse of discretion, or otherwise unlawful. The court also applied the two-step framework commonly used to determine whether an agency’s interpretation of a statute is permissible.

Rulings

The court rejected the challenge to DHS’s authority to issue the revocation regulation. It concluded that Congress had not directly addressed whether DHS could revoke U nonimmigrant status, but that 8 U.S.C. §§ 1184(a)(1) and 1103(a)(3) could reasonably be interpreted to authorize regulations governing the time and conditions of nonimmigrant admission. The court held that the revocation regulation was based on a permissible construction of those statutes, was entitled to deference, and was not beyond DHS’s statutory authority.

The court nevertheless held that USCIS’s specific revocation decision was arbitrary and capricious. The agency had approved Chaparro Navarro’s petition on October 1, 2012, then waited nearly two years before issuing the revocation notice. The notice stated only that the approval had been made in error. The defendants did not identify unusual circumstances justifying the delay, explain why the alleged error was not discovered earlier, or provide a reason for waiting two years. The court emphasized the importance of finality and the reliance interests associated with U nonimmigrant status, including the ability to seek lawful permanent resident status after three years of continuous physical presence.

Because it found an Administrative Procedure Act violation on that ground, the court did not decide the plaintiffs’ other arguments about the revocation process or the agency’s substantive eligibility findings.

The court also granted the requested mandamus relief concerning Morales’s derivative petition. It ordered USCIS to consider that petition because the court had concluded that the revocation of Chaparro Navarro’s status was arbitrary and capricious.

Disposition

The court stated that the plaintiffs’ motion for summary judgment was granted in part and denied in part. It directed the parties to meet and confer and submit a stipulated proposed judgment within 14 days. The opinion excerpt does not separately state the disposition of the defendants’ cross-motion or identify which specific part of the plaintiffs’ motion was denied.