Sosnava Rodriguez v. Vergara

Case: 26-50183 Document: 306-1 Page: 1 Date Filed: 10/23/2026 United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit United States Court of Appeals Fifth Circuit ____________ FILED October 23, 2026 No. 26-50183 Thomas B. Plunkett, III ____________ Clerk Ignacio Sosnava Rodriguez, Petitioner—Appellee, versus Miguel Vergara, in his official capacity as Director of the San Antonio Field Office of I.C.E. Enforcement and Removal Operations; Markwayne Mullin, Secretary, U.S. Department of Homeland Security; Todd Wallace Blanche, U.S. Attorney General; Department of Homeland Security; DOJ Executive Office for Immigration Review, Respondents—Appellants. ______________________________ Appeal from the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas Civil Action No. 1:26-CV-273 ______________________________ consolidated with ____________ No. 26-50219 ____________ Alejandro Villegas Angel, Petitioner—Appellee, Case: 26-50183 Document: 306-1 Page: 2 Date Filed: 10/23/2026 versus Markwayne Mullin, Secretary, U.S. Department of Homeland Security; Todd Wallace Blanche, U.S. Attorney General; Miguel Vergara, Director, San Antonio Field Office for Enforcement and Removal; United States Department of Homeland Security; United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement; Executive Office for Immigration Review, Respondents—Appellants. ______________________________ Appeal from the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas Civil Action No. 1:26-CV-384 ______________________________ consolidated with ____________ No. 26-50221 ____________ Miguel Angel Gomez Alvarado, Petitioner—Appellee, versus Miguel Vergara, in his official capacity as Director of the San Antonio Field Office for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement; David Venturella, in his capacity as the Acting Director for the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement; Markwayne Mullin, Secretary, U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Respondents—Appellants. 2 Case: 26-50183 Document: 306-1 Page: 3 Date Filed: 10/23/2026 ______________________________ Appeal from the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas Civil Action No. 1:26-CV-309 ______________________________ Before Elrod, Chief Judge, and Jones, Smith, Stewart, Richman, Southwick, Haynes, Graves, Higginson, Willett, Ho, Duncan, Engelhardt, Oldham, Wilson, Douglas, and Ramirez, Circuit Judges. Cory T. Wilson, Circuit Judge, joined by Elrod, Chief Judge, and Jones, Smith, Richman, Willett, Ho, Duncan, Engelhardt, and Oldham, Circuit Judges: * Petitioners, three aliens who had been living unlawfully in the United States for many years, were detained by immigration authorities pending removal proceedings pursuant to 8 U.S.C. § 1225(b)(2)(A). All three sought habeas relief, inter alia, on the ground that their detention violated their right to due process under the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution. In each case, the district courts agreed. The courts ordered Petitioners to be released and enjoined federal authorities from further detaining them without first conducting bond hearings to assess their individual dangerousness and flight risk. A panel of this court consolidated the ensuing appeals and expedited briefing and argument. A divided panel of this court affirmed, concluding that the Fifth Amendment conferred a right on these aliens to receive individualized hearings on their dangerousness and flight risk. The panel majority also imposed a novel rule that such hearings must be conducted within 90 days of an alien’s confinement, even as removal proceedings remain ongoing. Although the district courts’ grants of habeas to two of the _____________________ * Judge Richman concurs in the judgment. 3 Case: 26-50183 Document: 306-1 Page: 4 Date Filed: 10/23/2026 Nos. 26-50183, 26-50219, 26-50221 Petitioners were premature under this 90-day rule, the panel nevertheless upheld the habeas relief. This court sua sponte ordered rehearing en banc, again expedited briefing and argument, and stayed the underlying district court orders granting habeas relief. We now conclude that Petitioners were not entitled to individual hearings on their dangerousness or flight risk before they could be lawfully detained by immigration authorities pending their removal proceedings. Moreover, the duration of Petitioners’ detention presented no constitutional issues warranting habeas relief. Accordingly, we reverse the district courts’ decisions and vacate their grants of habeas relief. I. Ignacio Sosnava Rodriguez is a Mexican national who has resided in the United States without inspection or admission for over twenty-two years. In December 2025, Sosnava was detained by United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) following a traffic stop. He filed a habeas petition on February 13, 2026, which the district court granted on February 25, 2026. Alejandro Villegas Angel is a Mexican national who has resided in the United States without inspection or admission since 2011. He has two children who are American citizens. In February 2026, Villegas was stopped by police for driving without a license and was transferred to ICE custody. He filed a habeas petition on February 17, 2026, which the district court granted on March 3, 2026. Miguel Angel Gomez Alvarado is a Honduran national who has resided in the United States without inspection or admission since 2012. He has one child who is an American citizen. In November 2025, Gomez was detained by ICE following a traffic stop. He filed a habeas petition on February 6, 2026, which the district court granted on March 2, 2026. 4 Case: 26-50183 Document: 306-1 Page: 5 Date Filed: 10/23/2026 Nos. 26-50183, 26-50219, 26-50221 These three men were placed in federal custody pursuant to 8 U.S.C. § 1225(b)(2)(A), which mandates that “an alien seeking admission [who] is not clearly and beyond a doubt entitled to be admitted . . . shall be detained” pending removal proceedings. Section 1225(b)(2)(A) “says [no]thing whatsoever about bond hearings.” Buenrostro-Mendez v. Bondi, 166 F.4th 494, 502 (5th Cir. 2026) (quoting Jennings v. Rodriguez, 583 U.S. 281, 297 (2018)). In their habeas petitions, however, Petitioners asserted that their detention under § 1225(b)(2)(A), absent bond hearings to determine individual dangerousness or flight risk, violated their Fifth Amendment right to due process. See U.S. Const. amend. V. In three substantively similar orders, the district courts treated Petitioners’ claims as an assertion of their right to procedural due process and concluded that bond hearings on dangerousness and flight risk were constitutionally required, even if such procedural steps are not encompassed by § 1225(b)(2)(A). Accordingly, the district courts ordered Petitioners released and enjoined federal immigration authorities from further detaining them without first conducting such bond hearings. Petitioners were released from detention shortly after their respective habeas petitions were granted. Respondents—a collection of federal immigration authorities— timely appealed these rulings. A motions panel of this court granted the Respondents’ motions to expedite the appeals on April 6, 2026, and ordered expedited briefing and argument. Because the cases presented similar questions concerning the constitutionality of detention pending removal proceedings pursuant to § 1225(b)(2)(A), the panel also consolidated them for hearing and decision. A merits panel heard oral argument in April 2026. In July, the panel upheld the district courts’ rulings. The panel majority determined that a mix of procedural and substantive considerations guaranteed Petitioners a bond 5 Case: 26-50183 Document: 306-1 Page: 6 Date Filed: 10/23/2026 Nos. 26-50183, 26-50219, 26-50221 hearing on their dangerousness and flight risk within, at most, 90 days of their detention under § 1225(b)(2)(A). Sosnava Rodriguez v. Ortega, 180 F.4th 702, 727–28 (5th Cir.), vacated and reh’g granted, 181 F.4th 608 (5th Cir. 2026). The majority then affirmed the district courts’ habeas grants, reasoning that, had Petitioners still been detained without a bond hearing at the time of the panel’s decision, the timeline espoused by the majority would require their release. Id. The en banc court sua sponte ordered rehearing. See Sosnava Rodriguez, 181 F.4th at 609. The court again expedited briefing and thereafter stayed the district court judgments pending rehearing. The court heard en banc argument on September 24, 2026. II. Before 1996, the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) treated aliens differently depending on whether an alien presented himself at a port of entry or simply entered illegally into the United States. See 8 U.S.C. §§ 1225(a), 1251(a) (1994). Under this older framework, an alien’s physical entry into the country controlled what removal proceedings would apply and whether the alien would be detained during those proceedings. See Buenrostro-Mendez, 166 F.4th at 498. Aliens who arrived at a port of entry were subject to mandatory detention during their exclusion proceedings, whereas aliens who evaded inspection and entered the country illegally “could seek release on bond” while deportation proceedings were ongoing. Id. Over time, this statutory scheme produced “th[e] unintended and undesirable consequence” of allowing illegal entrants to “take advantage of . . . greater procedural and substantive rights afforded in deportation proceedings” than those who properly presented themselves to authorities at a port of entry. Martinez v. Att’y Gen., 693 F.3d 408, 413 n.5 (3d Cir. 2012). 6 Case: 26-50183 Document: 306-1 Page: 7 Date Filed: 10/23/2026 Nos. 26-50183, 26-50219, 26-50221 In 1996, Congress passed the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRIRA) to remedy this discrepancy. Pub. L. 104-208, 110 Stat. 3009 (Sept. 30, 1996). IIRIRA aimed to “ensure[ ] that all immigrants who have not been lawfully admitted, regardless of their physical presence in the country, are placed on equal footing in removal proceedings under the INA.” Torres v. Barr, 976 F.3d 918, 928 (9th Cir. 2020) (en banc) (emphasis added); see also Buenrostro-Mendez, 166 F.4th at 499 (IIRIRA “aimed to reduce this incongruity” of treatment). To that end, IIRIRA established one set of removal procedures for aliens who have been “admitted” to the United States and another for those who have not. Three sections of Title 8 solidify this distinction: 8 U.S.C. § 1225(a) deems any alien “present in the United States who has not been admitted or who arrives in the United States” as an “applicant for admission.” 8 U.S.C. § 1225(a)(1). “Admission” is “the lawful entry of the alien into the United States after inspection and authorization by an immigration officer.” Id. § 1101(a)(13)(A). Our court has recently clarified that, as used in the statute, “alien seeking admission” and “applicant for admission” are synonymous. See Buenrostro-Mendez, 166 F.4th at 503 (citing 8 U.S.C. § 1225(a)(3), (b)(2)(A)). 8 U.S.C. § 1225(b) mandates that “if the examining immigration officer determines that an alien seeking admission is not clearly and beyond a doubt entitled to be admitted, the alien shall be detained for a [removal] proceeding.” Id. § 1225(b)(2)(A) (emphasis added). Federal regulations provide additional procedures for immigration officers to follow in making this determination and list relevant documentation that aliens may use to establish either their past admission or present admissibility. See, e.g., 8 C.F.R. §§ 1235.4, 1235.6, 1235.8–1235.11. 7 Case: 26-50183 Document: 306-1 Page: 8 Date Filed: 10/23/2026 Nos. 26-50183, 26-50219, 26-50221 8 U.S.C. § 1226 establishes removal procedures for aliens generally, including those who may not specifically qualify as “applicants for admission” (e.g., aliens who have overstayed a visa). Such aliens “may be arrested and detained pending a [removal] decision” following issuance of a warrant by the Attorney General. Id. § 1226(a). However, the Attorney General retains discretion to “continue to detain the arrested alien” or to release the alien on bond or parole. Id. § 1226(a)(1)–(2). After IIRIRA went into effect, the Immigration and Naturalization Service and its successor agencies within the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), as well as many immigration judges, tended to treat aliens apprehended in the interior of the United States as “aliens” subject to discretionary detention under § 1226(a), as opposed to “applicants for admission” subject to mandatory detention under § 1225(b)(2)(A). See Buenrostro-Mendez, 166 F.4th at 500. But in July 2025, DHS “revisited its legal position on detention and release authorities.” Immigr. & Customs Enf’t, Interim Guidance Regarding Detention Auth. for Applications for Admission (July 8, 2025), https://perma.cc/2V6H-FHVD. The agency determined that aliens who qualify as “applicants for admission,” including those apprehended in the interior, “are subject to detention under [§ 1225(b)(2)(A)] and may not be released from ICE custody except by [discretionary] parole.” Id. Thus, unlike “aliens admitted to the United States and chargeable with deportability,” applicants for admission are not “eligible for a custody determination and release on recognizance, bond, or other conditions[.]” Id. This understanding has since been adopted by the Board of Immigration Appeals. See In re Yajure Hurtado, 29 I. & N. Dec. 216, 228 (B.I.A. 2025). Earlier this year, our court held that the definition of “applicants for admission” under § 1225 extends to aliens residing in the United States who have never been lawfully admitted to the country. See Buenrostro-Mendez, 8 Case: 26-50183 Document: 306-1 Page: 9 Date Filed: 10/23/2026 Nos. 26-50183, 26-50219, 26-50221 166 F.4th at 506–07; see also Avila v. Bondi, 170 F.4th 1128, 1133 (8th Cir. 2026) (same). In Buenrostro-Mendez, this court upheld the mandatory detention of “applicants for admission” under § 1225(b)(2)(A), noting that the provision does not “say[ ] anything whatsoever about bond hearings.” 166 F.4th at 502 (quoting Jennings, 583 U.S. at 297). This reading, which harmonizes the treatment of unadmitted aliens regardless of their physical entry into the country, best aligns with the statutory text and “better honors [the] predominant goal in the enactment of [the] IIRIRA.” Buenrostro- Mendez, 166 F.4th at 508. III. With this statutory framework and precedent in mind, we assess Petitioners’ habeas claims. We review de novo a district court’s grant of a petition for a writ of habeas corpus under 28 U.S.C. § 2241. Pack v. Yusuff, 218 F.3d 448, 451 (5th Cir. 2000). “[T]he writ of habeas corpus has historically been regarded as an extraordinary remedy, a bulwark against convictions that violate fundamental fairness.” Brecht v. Abrahamson, 507 U.S. 619, 633 (1993) (quotation and citation omitted). Habeas relief obtains only when detainees are “in custody in violation of the Constitution or laws or treaties of the United States.” 28 U.S.C. § 2241(c)(3); see also id. § 2254(a). Thus, to prevail on habeas review, Petitioners must demonstrate that their detention under § 1225(b)(2)(A) is the result of a constitutional violation. See Lowery v. Collins, 988 F.2d 1364, 1367 (5th Cir. 1993). Petitioners do not dispute that they are “applicants for admission” within the meaning of § 1225 and thus subject to mandatory detention pending their removal proceedings under the statute. Petitioners instead urge that their detention without a bond hearing violates their rights under the Fifth Amendment’s Due Process Clause, even if § 1225(b)(2)(A) does not require any such hearing before imposing detention. We disagree. 9 Case: 26-50183 Document: 306-1 Page: 10 Date Filed: 10/23/2026 Nos. 26-50183, 26-50219, 26-50221 A. The district courts treated Petitioners’ claims as assertions of a right to procedural due process, a framing which Petitioners re-urge on appeal. A procedural due process challenge asserts that “the established state procedure . . . destroys [a plaintiff’s] entitlement without according him proper procedural safeguards.” Logan v. Zimmerman Brush Co., 455 U.S. 422, 436 (1982) (emphasis added) (quotation omitted). Thus, Petitioners’ procedural due process challenge is not an assertion that Congress lacks the power to detain illegal aliens such as themselves, but only that the procedure they received was insufficient to justify that detention. In assessing Petitioners’ claims, the district courts applied the balancing test set forth in Mathews v. Eldridge, 424 U.S. 319 (1976), which generally requires consideration of three distinct factors: First, the private interest that will be affected by the official action; second, the risk of an erroneous deprivation of such interest through the procedures used, and the probable value, if any, of additional or substitute procedural safeguards; and finally, the Government’s interest, including the function involved and the fiscal and administrative burdens that the additional or substitute procedural requirement would entail. Id. at 335 (citation omitted). The district courts concluded that Petitioners’ interest in physical liberty was profound and that an appreciable risk of erroneous detention could be negated by bond hearings on Petitioners’ dangerousness and flight risk. Waving aside the Government’s interest in ensuring prompt removal of illegal aliens following their removal proceedings, the district courts found that the Mathews factors clearly 10 Case: 26-50183 Document: 306-1 Page: 11 Date Filed: 10/23/2026 Nos. 26-50183, 26-50219, 26-50221 favored Petitioners, such that their continued detention absent such bond hearings was unconstitutional. 1 There is no dispute that Petitioners enjoy the protections of the Fifth Amendment. See Mathews v. Diaz, 426 U.S. 67, 77 (1976). So the issue in this case is not whether Petitioners are entitled to due process. Rather, the question is what specific process is due for unadmitted aliens pending their removal proceedings—bearing in mind that Congress enjoys “broad power over naturalization and immigration” and “regularly makes rules that would be unacceptable if applied to citizens.” Id. at 79–80. The answer to that question is straightforward: Because Petitioners have never been admitted to the United States, due process does not entitle them to additional proceedings beyond what Congress has provided before they may be detained pending removal. And even granting that such a challenge is possible, the facts Petitioners seek to prove at their bond hearings are irrelevant to detention under § 1225(b)(2)(A), such that the absence of those hearings did not render their detention constitutionally defective. It was thus error to grant habeas relief on procedural due process grounds. 1. Aliens seeking admission to the United States have only a limited ability to challenge their admission process on constitutional grounds. In DHS v. Thuraissigiam, 591 U.S. 103 (2020), the Supreme Court recognized that “the Constitution gives [Congress] plenary authority to decide which _____________________ 1 Judge Pitman’s order in Sosnava’s case treated all three Mathews factors as decisively favoring Sosnava. Judge Ezra’s orders in Villegas’s and Gomez’s cases determined that the first two factors (weight of private interest and likelihood of erroneous deprivation) weighed strongly in their favor, but concluded that the third was “neutral” given the Government’s interest in ensuring that the aliens appeared for their removal proceedings and did not pose a danger to the public. 11 Case: 26-50183 Document: 306-1 Page: 12 Date Filed: 10/23/2026 Nos. 26-50183, 26-50219, 26-50221 aliens to admit and a concomitant . . . power to set the procedures to be followed in determining whether an alien should be admitted.” Id. at 139 (citations omitted). When “foreigners who have never been naturalized, nor acquired any domicil or residence within the United States, nor even been admitted into the country pursuant to law” interact with those procedures, “the decisions of executive or administrative officers, acting within powers expressly conferred by Congress, are due process of law.” Id. at 138 (quoting Nishimura Ekiu v. United States, 142 U.S. 651, 660 (1892)) (emphasis added). Thuraissigiam was apprehended twenty-five yards inside the border, shortly after crossing, and the Supreme Court treated him as if he had been stopped at the border. The Court observed that “an alien who tries to enter the country illegally is treated as an ‘applicant for admission,’ § 1225(a)(1), and an alien who is detained shortly after unlawful entry cannot be said to have ‘effected an entry.’” Id. So “an alien like [Thuraissigiam] is ‘on the threshold,’” id. (quoting Shaughnessy v. United States ex rel. Mezei, 345 U.S. 206, 212 (1953)), and therefore “has only those rights regarding admission that Congress has provided by statute.” Id. at 140; see also Landon v. Plasencia, 459 U.S. 21, 32 (1982) (“This Court has long held that an alien seeking initial admission to the United States requests a privilege and has no constitutional rights regarding his application, for the power to admit or exclude aliens is a sovereign prerogative.”). Petitioners’ illegal entry did not change their status as “applicants for admission,” as recent precedent makes clear. Buenrostro-Mendez, 166 F.4th at 499 (“Following the passage of IIRIRA[,] an alien’s status as an applicant for admission does not turn on where or how the alien entered the United States.”); id. at 502 (“The petitioners are deemed, by statute, to be 12 Case: 26-50183 Document: 306-1 Page: 13 Date Filed: 10/23/2026 Nos. 26-50183, 26-50219, 26-50221 applicants for admission pending the resolution of removal proceedings.”). 2 Nor has Petitioners’ unlawful residence in the United States unlocked the right to a bond hearing pending their removal proceedings. For over a century, the Supreme Court has suggested that aliens who enter and live in the United States, even unlawfully, may possess some constitutional due-process protection beyond whatever Congress provides by statute. See, e.g., Mezei, 345 U.S. at 212 (1953); Zadvydas v. Davis, 533 U.S. 678, 693 (2001). But in Thuraissigiam, the Supreme Court emphasized that admission status—not physical presence—informs what procedural rights are available to an alien. See 591 U.S. at 139 (explaining that the plenary- power doctrine would be “meaningless if it became inoperative as soon as an arriving alien set foot on U. S. soil”); see also Vartelas v. Holder, 566 U.S. 257, 262 (2012) (“In IIRIRA, Congress . . . made ‘admission’ the key word” in deciding what process an alien received. (citation omitted)). And Congress (per its plenary power over immigration), rather than the judiciary, _____________________ 2 Judge Higginson, much like Judge Douglas, urges the full court to overrule Buenrostro-Mendez’s interpretation of 8 U.S.C. § 1225(b)(2). Post, at 142. But this court already declined to do so by denying the en banc petition filed in that case. Buenrostro- Mendez v. Bondi, No. 25-20496 consolidated with No. 25-40701, (5th Cir. Apr. 9, 2026) (per curiam) (denying petition for rehearing en banc). Regardless, another point about Judge Higginson’s opinion—and its grounding in the canon of constitutional avoidance—bears mentioning. The “canon of constitutional avoidance ‘comes into play only when, after the application of ordinary textual analysis, the statute is found to be susceptible of more than one construction.’” Jennings, 583 U.S. at 297 (citing Clark v. Martinez, 543 U.S. 371, 385 (2005)). There is no such textual ambiguity in § 1225(b)(2), as this court explained in Buenrostro-Mendez. Therefore, our dissenting colleague’s appeal to that canon is altogether misplaced. Indeed, the Supreme Court in Jennings rejected the Ninth Circuit’s use of the canon of constitutional avoidance for similar reasons. Jennings, 583 U.S. at 296 (stating that the Ninth Circuit “misapplied the canon” of constitutional avoidance because its “interpretations of the provisions” at issue in that case were “implausible”). 13 Case: 26-50183 Document: 306-1 Page: 14 Date Filed: 10/23/2026 Nos. 26-50183, 26-50219, 26-50221 demarcates the parameters of admission status. Thuraissigiam, 591 U.S. at 107. This understanding accords with established precedent instructing that only “once an alien gains admission to our country and begins to develop the ties that go with permanent residence [does] his constitutional status change[ ] accordingly.” Plasencia, 459 U.S. at 32 (citing Johnson v. Eisentrager, 339 U.S. 763, 770 (1950)) (emphasis added). Petitioners are concededly “applicants for admission” under § 1225(b)(2)(A), and they may not assert a right to further process governing their admission beyond what Congress has provided in § 1225(b)(2)(A). Thuraissigiam, 591 U.S. at 138; accord Jennings, 583 U.S. at 303 (The language of “§ 1226(c) reinforces the conclusion that aliens detained under its authority are not entitled to be released under any circumstances other than those expressly recognized by the statute.”); but see Lopez-Campos v. Raycraft, 175 F.4th 713, 759 (6th Cir. 2026) (Murphy, J., dissenting) (recognizing that the Supreme Court has “suggested that immigrants in the country might have some basic due-process rights apart from any statute” but concluding that § 1225(b)(2) does not violate the Due Process Clause). The Constitution does not entitle them to a bond hearing. The Supreme Court “has repeatedly emphasized that ‘over no conceivable subject is the legislative power of Congress more complete than it is over’ the admission of aliens.” Fiallo v. Bell, 430 U.S. 787, 792 (1977) (quoting Oceanic Navigation Co. v. Stranahan, 214 U.S. 320, 339 (1909)). 3 _____________________ 3 Discounting Congress’s authority in this sphere, Judges Southwick and Higginson, in their dissents, cite Zadvydas v. Davis (discussed infra at Section III.B.3) for the proposition that Congress’s “plenary power” over immigration is “subject to 14 Case: 26-50183 Document: 306-1 Page: 15 Date Filed: 10/23/2026 Nos. 26-50183, 26-50219, 26-50221 Manifestly, IIRIRA “aimed to reduce [the] incongruity” whereby “greater procedural and substantive rights” were afforded to “aliens who bypassed entry procedures” than to those who endeavored to follow lawful procedures at their initial entry. Buenrostro-Mendez, 166 F.4th at 498–99. Yet by ignoring Thuraissigiam’s indication that unadmitted aliens may be limited to the admission procedures that Congress provides, the district courts here reintroduced the very procedural backwardness Congress sought to resolve in enacting IIRIRA. Those courts were not free to circumvent Congress and engraft the pre-1996 regime and its perverse incentives back onto IIRIRA by invoking the Due Process Clause. Nor may this court. Petitioners have received the process due to unadmitted aliens, and granting habeas relief based on the district courts’ contrary conclusion was erroneous. 2. Even granting that Petitioners may challenge the admissions process Congress has provided, their claims would still fail because procedural due process does not require bond hearings centered on assessing dangerousness and flight risk in the context of § 1225(b)(2)(A). “In Mathews v. Eldridge, the Court set forth [the] factors that normally determine whether an individual has received the ‘process’ that the Constitution finds ‘due.’” City of Los Angeles v. David, 538 U.S. 715, 716 _____________________ important constitutional limits.” 533 U.S. 678, 695 (2001); see also post, at 116-17, 147 (Judges Southwick and Higginson, dissenting). Judge Southwick asserts, ipse dixit, that the hearing Petitioners desire is one such limit. But that framing begs the threshold question at which we and the primary dissent diverge—and it omits that Zadvydas cabins its holding to aliens whom “the Government finds itself unable to remove” and who otherwise face “an indefinite term of imprisonment within the United States.” That is, to aliens not in Petitioners’ shoes. 15 Case: 26-50183 Document: 306-1 Page: 16 Date Filed: 10/23/2026 Nos. 26-50183, 26-50219, 26-50221 (2003). But “[p]laintiffs who assert a right to a hearing under the Due Process Clause must show that the facts they seek to establish in that hearing are relevant under the statutory scheme.” Conn. Dep’t of Pub. Safety v. Doe, 538 U.S. 1, 8 (2003) (emphasis added). Here, they are not. Doe illustrates this principle well. In Doe, a convicted sex offender asserted a right to a hearing on his individual dangerousness before being forced to register as a sex offender. Id. at 6. The Court rejected his challenge, holding that the respondent’s dangerousness was “of no consequence” to the statute, which required registration of all convicted sex offenders without reference to individual dangerousness. Id. at 7. Because the statute rendered respondent’s dangerousness irrelevant to his registration, his procedural due process claim was a substantive due process claim “recast in procedural due process terms.” Id. at 8 (quotation omitted). And unless he could show that the “substantive rule of law [was] defective . . . , any hearing on current dangerousness [was] a bootless exercise.” Id. at 7–8. Justice Scalia’s concurrence in Doe elucidates that many statutes, by their nature, may only be challenged on the grounds of substantive, rather than procedural, due process: [E]ven if the requirements of [a] law implicate a liberty interest[,] the categorical abrogation of that liberty interest by a validly enacted statute suffices to provide all the process that is “due”—just as a state law providing that no one under the age of 16 may operate a motor vehicle suffices to abrogate that liberty interest. Absent a claim . . . that the liberty interest in question is so fundamental as to implicate so-called “substantive” due process, a properly enacted law can eliminate it. That is ultimately why, as the Court’s opinion demonstrates, a convicted sex offender has no more right to additional “process” enabling him to establish that he is not dangerous than . . . a 15-year-old has a right to “process” enabling him to establish that he is a safe driver. 16 Case: 26-50183 Document: 306-1 Page: 17 Date Filed: 10/23/2026 Nos. 26-50183, 26-50219, 26-50221 Doe, 538 U.S. at 8–9 (Scalia, J., concurring) (emphasis added); see also id. at 8 (majority opinion) (Doe’s claim was a substantive due process claim “recast in procedural due process terms.” (quotation omitted)). While the statutory scheme considered in Doe differs from the immigration law at issue here, Doe highlights the problem with Petitioners’ claims. Just as the statute in Doe mandated registration for sex offenders without any hearing on individual dangerousness, 8 U.S.C. § 1225(b)(2)(A) mandates detention for “an applicant for admission, if the examining immigration officer determines that [the alien] is not clearly and beyond a doubt entitled to be admitted,” with no reference to an alien’s individual dangerousness or flight risk. An alien is either “clearly and beyond a doubt entitled to be admitted” or not. If not, he may be detained pending removal proceedings. Id.; see also Buenrostro-Mendez, 166 F.4th at 502. Petitioners do not assert that the process they received was insufficient to prove that they are “entitled to be admitted,” and any determinations made at the bond hearings imposed by the district courts would be irrelevant to the lawfulness of Petitioners’ detention under § 1225(b)(2)(A). See Buenrostro-Mendez, 166 F.4th at 502; accord Jennings, 583 U.S. at 307–12 (concluding that the text of § 1225 cannot be read to require bond hearings on the propriety of release). This mismatch is brought into sharp relief by the fact that neither the district courts, nor the Petitioners, cite any authority indicating the need for individual bond hearings pending removal proceedings, much less under § 1225(b)(2)(A) in particular. At most, Petitioners offer that limiting aliens’ dangerousness or flight risk is a central justification for detention. But they cite no authority suggesting the Government may only detain aliens pending removal when such risks are established via individual hearings. Indeed, the Supreme Court has repeatedly made clear that Congress may mandate detention for certain classes of aliens without individual determinations of the type Petitioners seek. See Demore v. Kim, 538 U.S. 510, 513 n.1, 518, 525–28 17 Case: 26-50183 Document: 306-1 Page: 18 Date Filed: 10/23/2026 Nos. 26-50183, 26-50219, 26-50221 (2003); see also id. at 523, 525 (“[T]his Court has recognized detention during deportation proceedings as a constitutionally valid aspect of the deportation process,” even where “[t]here [is] no ‘individualized finding’ of likely future dangerousness[.]” (quoting Carlson v. Landon, 342 U.S. 524, 543 (1952) (citation modified))); Reno v. Flores, 507 U.S. 292, 314 n.9 (1993) (rejecting the call for “fully individualized custody determinations”). Petitioners, and our dissenting colleagues, downplay Doe by asserting that the liberty interest at stake here is more profound than the reputational interests invoked by the respondent in Doe. But this is the precise argument the court of appeals espoused—and the Supreme Court rejected—in Doe. There, the court of appeals reasoned that the respondent had a substantive liberty interest at stake and was entitled to additional procedures to vindicate that interest. See Doe, 538 U.S. at 6 (“The Court of Appeals reasoned that the law implicated a ‘liberty interest’ . . . . From this liberty interest arose an obligation, in the Court of Appeals’ view, to give respondent an opportunity to demonstrate that he was not ‘likely to be currently dangerous.’”). But the Supreme Court determined that the significance of the asserted liberty interest was “unnecessary” to ascertain because “even assuming, arguendo, that respondent has been deprived of a liberty interest, due process does not entitle him to a hearing to establish a fact that is not material under the Connecticut statute.” Id. at 7. If the liberty interest argument was irrelevant in Doe, it must be irrelevant here. Even assuming arguendo that the asserted liberty interest’s significance matters, this argument does not cure the problem with Petitioners’ claims. The significance of Petitioners’ liberty interest might be germane in weighing what due process requires with respect to the substantive determinations of § 1225(b)(2)(A). See Mathews, 424 U.S. at 335. But procedural “due process does not entitle [Petitioners] to a hearing to establish a fact that is not material under [the] statute.” Doe, 538 U.S. at 7. 18 Case: 26-50183 Document: 306-1 Page: 19 Date Filed: 10/23/2026 Nos. 26-50183, 26-50219, 26-50221 Doe indicates what the proper result should be in weighing the Mathews factors: Granting that § 1225(b)(2)(A) deprives the Petitioners of an important liberty interest, there is no risk of “erroneous deprivation” of that interest that would be cured by hearings on dangerousness or flight risk. Neither factor has any bearing on whether Petitioners are “entitled to be admitted” to the country. 8 U.S.C. § 1225(b)(2)(A); Mathews, 424 U.S. at 335. Indeed, hearings on Petitioners’ family connections in the United States, or their earning potential, or whether they drive American-made automobiles would be just as relevant to whether they may be detained under § 1225(b)(2)(A). Which is to say, not relevant at all. The district courts’ Mathews analysis ignores this disconnect entirely. 4 At bottom, the district courts erred in their Mathews analysis by failing to address how bond hearings on dangerousness or flight risk could be relevant to Petitioners’ classification as “applicants for admission,” which Petitioners do not contest, and their resultant detention under § 1225(b)(2)(A). Because the notional hearings would be irrelevant to those determinations, the lack of hearings did not render Petitioners