Jorge Santana-Figueroa v. Immigration and Naturalization Service

A 70 year-old citizen of Mexico has resided in the United States nearly 14 years as a responsible, law-abiding, taxpaying, churchgoing member of his community. Uneducated and unskilled, he has been employed as a maintenance man and has used his meager earnings to support both his family in Mexico and himself without public assistance. He concedes deportability but asserts that deportation would cause him extreme hardship, not only severing his ties to the community but also rendering him unable to find any employment.

An immigration judge found the petitioner ineligible for discretionary relief, not because he had failed to show any hardship but because “[h]is hardship is bottomed primarily on economic factors.” Employing similar reasoning, a divided Board of Immigration Appeals dismissed the petitioner’s appeal.

I. Principles of Review

Congress has given the Attorney General discretion to suspend deportation of certain deportable aliens to prevent “extreme hardship.” 8 U.S.C. § 1254 (a)(1) “These words are not self-explanatory, and .. . the Act commits their definition in the first instance to the Attorney General and his delegates .. .. ” INS v. Wang, - U.S. -at -, 101 S.Ct.…