(Slip Opinion)              OCTOBER TERM, 2022                                       1

                                       Syllabus

         NOTE: Where it is feasible, a syllabus (headnote) will be released, as is
       being done in connection with this case, at the time the opinion is issued.
       The syllabus constitutes no part of the opinion of the Court but has been
       prepared by the Reporter of Decisions for the convenience of the reader.
       See United States v. Detroit Timber & Lumber Co., 

.


SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

                                       Syllabus

         PUGIN v. GARLAND, ATTORNEY GENERAL

CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR
                 THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

       No. 22–23.     Argued April 17, 2023—Decided June 22, 2023*
In two immigration proceedings, noncitizens Fernando Cordero-Garcia
  and Jean Francois Pugin were determined removable from the United
  States on the ground that they had convictions for aggravated felo-
  nies—namely, offenses “relating to obstruction of justice.” See 

(a)(43)(S), 1227(a)(2)(A)(iii). On appeal, the Ninth Cir-
  cuit concluded that Cordero-Garcia’s state conviction for dissuading a
  witness from reporting a crime did not constitute an offense “relating
  to obstruction of justice” because the state offense did not require that
  an investigation or proceeding be pending. By contrast, the Fourth
  Circuit concluded that Pugin’s state conviction for accessory after the
  fact constituted an offense “relating to obstruction of justice” even if
  the state offense did not require that an investigation or proceeding be
  pending.
Held: An offense may “relat[e] to obstruction of justice” under
  §1101(a)(43)(S) even if the offense does not require that an investiga-
  tion or proceeding be pending. Federal law provides that noncitizens
  convicted of a federal or state crime constituting an “aggravated fel-
  ony” are removable from the United States. §1227(a)(2)(A)(iii). Con-
  gress expanded the definition of “aggravated felony” in 1996 to include
  offenses “relating to obstruction of justice.” §1101(a)(43)(S). Diction-
  ary definitions, federal laws, state laws, and the Model Penal Code
  show that federal or state obstruction offenses “relat[e] to obstruction
  of justice” under §1101(a)(43)(S) even if the offense does not require
  that an investigation or proceeding be pending. This extensive body of
——————
  * Together with No. 22–331, Garland, Attorney General v. Cordero-
Garcia, aka Cordero, on certiorari to the United States Court of Appeals
for the Ninth Circuit.
2                           PUGIN v. GARLAND

                                  Syllabus

    authority reflects common sense. Individuals can obstruct the process
    of justice even when an investigation or proceeding is not pending. In-
    deed, obstruction of justice is often “most effective” when it prevents
    “an investigation or proceeding from commencing in the first place.”
    Brief for Attorney General 15. The Court declines to adopt an inter-
    pretation of the statute that would exclude many common obstruction
    offenses from the definition of aggravated felony under
    §1101(a)(43)(S). Finally, the phrase “relating to” resolves any doubt
    about the scope of §1101(a)(43)(S), because it ensures that the statute
    covers offenses having a connection with obstruction of justice—which
    surely covers common obstruction offenses that can occur when an in-
    vestigation or proceeding is not pending.
       Pugin’s and Cordero-Garcia’s contrary arguments lack merit. First,
    even if a specific prohibition in 

(a) requires that an
    investigation or proceeding be pending, Congress defined offenses un-
    der §1101(a)(43)(S) more broadly. Second, the historical record does
    not support the claim that obstruction of justice requires that an in-
    vestigation or proceeding be pending. Third, reading §1101(a)(43)(S)
    to cover offenses that do not require a pending investigation or pro-
    ceeding may create some redundancy, but the better overall reading of
    a statute sometimes contains some redundancy. Fourth, resort to the
    rule of lenity has no place here because the traditional tools of statu-
    tory interpretation show that an offense “relating to obstruction of jus-
    tice” does not require that an investigation or proceeding be pending.
    Pp. 3–10.
No. 22–23, 

, affirmed; No. 22–331, 

, reversed
 and remanded.

   KAVANAUGH, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which ROBERTS,
C. J., and THOMAS, ALITO, BARRETT, and JACKSON, JJ., joined. JACKSON,
J., filed a concurring opinion. SOTOMAYOR, J., filed a dissenting opinion,
in which GORSUCH, J., joined, and in which KAGAN, J., joined as to all but
Part III.
                        Cite as: 

 (2023)                              1

                             Opinion of the Court

     NOTICE: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in the
     United States Reports. Readers are requested to notify the Reporter of
     Decisions, Supreme Court of the United States, Washington, D. C. 20543,
     [email protected], of any typographical or other formal errors.


SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
                                   _________________

                            Nos. 22–23 and 22–331
                                   _________________


      JEAN FRANCOIS PUGIN, PETITIONER
22–23                v.
   MERRICK B. GARLAND, ATTORNEY GENERAL
 ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF
           APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT



   MERRICK B. GARLAND, ATTORNEY GENERAL,
                 PETITIONER
22–331                v.
  FERNANDO CORDERO-GARCIA, AKA FERNANDO
                  CORDERO
 ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF
            APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
                                 [June 22, 2023]

  JUSTICE KAVANAUGH delivered the opinion of the Court.
  Federal law provides that noncitizens convicted of an
“aggravated felony” are removable from the United States.
The definition of “aggravated felony” includes federal or
state offenses “relating to obstruction of justice.” 

(a)(43)(S). The question here is whether an offense
“relat[es] to obstruction of justice” under §1101(a)(43)(S)
even if the offense does not require that an investigation or
proceeding be pending. That question arises because some
obstruction offenses can occur when an investigation or
proceeding is not pending, such as threatening a witness to
prevent the witness from reporting a crime to the police.
2                    PUGIN v. GARLAND

                      Opinion of the Court

We conclude that an offense may “relat[e] to obstruction of
justice” under §1101(a)(43)(S) even if the offense does not
require that an investigation or proceeding be pending.
                               I
  This case stems from two immigration proceedings.
Fernando Cordero-Garcia is a citizen of Mexico. In 2009,
Cordero-Garcia was convicted of several California
offenses, including dissuading a witness from reporting a
crime. Jean Francois Pugin is a citizen of Mauritius. In
2014, Pugin was convicted of the Virginia offense of being
an accessory after the fact to a felony.
  As relevant here, the U. S. Department of Homeland
Security charged both Cordero-Garcia and Pugin as
removable from the United States on the ground that they
had convictions for aggravated felonies—namely, offenses
“relating to obstruction of justice.”         See 

(a)(43)(S), 1227(a)(2)(A)(iii).    In both cases, an
Immigration Judge ruled for the Department, as did the
Board of Immigration Appeals.
  Cordero-Garcia and Pugin petitioned for review in the
relevant Courts of Appeals. In Cordero-Garcia’s case, the
Ninth Circuit concluded, in pertinent part, that his state
conviction for dissuading a witness from reporting a crime
did not constitute an offense “relating to obstruction of
justice” because the state offense did not require that an
investigation or proceeding be pending. 

,
1188–1189 (2022). In Pugin’s case, by contrast, the Fourth
Circuit concluded that his state conviction for accessory
after the fact constituted an offense “relating to obstruction
of justice” even if the state offense did not require that an
investigation or proceeding be pending. 

, 450
(2021); see also Silva v. Garland, 

 (CA1
2022).
   This Court granted certiorari to resolve the conflict in the
Courts of Appeals. 

 (2023).
                   Cite as: 

 (2023)              3

                       Opinion of the Court

                               II
   Under the Immigration and Nationality Act, noncitizens
convicted of an “aggravated felony” are removable from the
United States. 

(a)(2)(A)(iii). The Act
defines “aggravated felony” to cover a broad range of federal
and state crimes. See §1101(a)(43).
   In 1996, Congress passed and President Clinton signed
legislation that expanded the definition of “aggravated
felony” to include offenses “relating to obstruction of justice,
perjury or subornation of perjury, or bribery of a witness,
for which the term of imprisonment is at least one year.”
§1101(a)(43)(S); 

; 

 at 3009–628.
   This Court has generally used the “categorical approach”
to determine whether a prior conviction qualifies as an
“aggravated felony” under §1101(a)(43).                Esquivel-
Quintana v. Sessions, 

 (2017); Moncrieffe
v. Holder, 

 (2013). Under that approach,
courts look to “the elements of the statute of conviction, not
to the facts of each defendant’s conduct.” Taylor v. United
States, 

 (1990). The Court’s role here is
not to fashion a separate federal obstruction offense, but
rather to determine which federal or state offenses “relat[e]
to obstruction of justice.”
   The question in this case is whether an offense “relat[es]
to obstruction of justice” under §1101(a)(43)(S) even if the
offense does not require that an investigation or proceeding
be pending. Dictionary definitions, federal laws, state laws,
and the Model Penal Code show that the answer is yes: An
offense “relat[es] to obstruction of justice” even if the offense
does not require that an investigation or proceeding be
pending.
   To begin, dictionaries from the time of §1101(a)(43)(S)’s
enactment in 1996 demonstrate that obstruction of justice
generally does not require a pending investigation or
proceeding. To take an illustrative formulation, obstruction
of justice covers “the crime or act of willfully interfering
4                    PUGIN v. GARLAND

                      Opinion of the Court

with the process of justice and law,” including “by
influencing, threatening, harming, or impeding a witness,
potential witness, juror, or judicial or legal officer or by
furnishing false information in or otherwise impeding an
investigation or legal process.”          Merriam-Webster’s
Dictionary of Law 337 (1996). The offense “captures every
willful act of corruption, intimidation, or force that tends
somehow to impair the machinery of the civil or criminal
law.” B. Garner, A Dictionary of Modern Legal Usage 611
(2d ed. 1995); see also Black’s Law Dictionary 1077 (6th ed.
1990) (“obstructing the administration of justice in any
way”); cf. Esquivel-Quintana, 581 U. S., at 391–392 (relying
on same dictionaries to interpret a different offense in
§1101(a)(43)).
  Notably missing from those dictionary definitions is a
requirement that an investigation or proceeding be
pending. The dictionaries demonstrate that obstruction of
justice includes offenses where an investigation or
proceeding is pending, but is not limited to offenses where
an investigation or proceeding is pending.
  In accord with the dictionary definitions, Title 18 of the
U. S. Code has long proscribed various obstruction offenses
that do not require a pending investigation or proceeding.
Entitled “Obstruction of Justice,” Chapter 73 of Title 18
houses many such offenses. For example, the federal
witness tampering statute covers various offenses, such as
killing or threatening a witness with an intent to prevent
the person from testifying at an official proceeding. See 

(a)(1)(A), (b)(1). That statute provides that
“an official proceeding need not be pending or about to be
instituted at the time of the offense.” §1512(f )(1). Likewise,
§1519 forbids assorted means of destroying, altering, or
falsifying records with an intent to obstruct certain
investigations or proceedings. That provision covers acts
intended to impede a federal investigation or proceeding,
“including one not even on the verge of commencement.”
                      Cite as: 

 (2023)                     5

                          Opinion of the Court

Yates v. United States, 

, 547 (2015) (plurality
opinion); see also 

 (proscribing acts to
obstruct the communication of certain information to
criminal investigators). 1
  The Solicitor General explains that many state
obstruction offenses as of 1996 similarly did not require
that an investigation or proceeding be pending. See, e.g.,

(3)(a) (1997); N. D. Cent. Code Ann.
§12.1–09–01(3)(c) (1997); State v. O’Neill, 

, 

 (1996); Brief for Attorney General 36–43
(collecting statutes); see also Commonwealth v. Berry, 

, 

 (1911); cf. Esquivel-
Quintana, 581 U. S., at 395–397 (looking to state statutes).
Some States did not label the relevant offenses as
“obstruction of justice,” but instead labeled the offenses
with a more precise term for the particular category of
obstruction at issue, such as witness tampering. But
Congress accounted for the variations in labels by crafting
the relevant definition in §1101(a)(43)(S) to cover offenses
“relating to obstruction of justice,” not just offenses labeled
as “obstruction of justice.” In any event, the terminology
that States use to categorize criminal offenses is not
dispositive because our inquiry here does not turn on
“technical definitions and labels under state law.” Taylor,

.
  For obstruction offenses, the Model Penal Code also
generally does not require that an investigation or
——————
   1 To be sure, one of those offenses—18 U. S. C. §1519—was enacted

after the passage of §1101(a)(43)(S) in its current form in 1996. But
§1519, too, reflects the longstanding ordinary understanding of
obstruction of justice—and no one here suggests that the ordinary
understanding in the years after 1996 somehow differed from the
ordinary understanding in 1996. See Branch v. Smith, 

 (2003) (plurality opinion of Scalia, J.) (“the most rudimentary rule of
statutory construction” is “that courts do not interpret statutes in
isolation, but in the context of the corpus juris of which they are a part,
including later-enacted statutes”).
6                     PUGIN v. GARLAND

                       Opinion of the Court

proceeding be pending. See generally ALI, Model Penal
Code §240.0(4), p. 3 (1980) (“ ‘official proceeding[s]’ ” include
those which “may be heard”). For witness tampering, for
example, the Model Penal Code focuses on an actor’s intent
to tamper with a witness, not whether an investigation or
proceeding is pending. See id., §241.6, Comment 2, at 166–
167 (“What is important is not that the actor believe that
an official proceeding or investigation will begin within a
certain span of time but rather that he recognize that his
conduct threatens obstruction of justice”).
   That extensive body of authority—dictionaries, federal
laws, state laws, and the Model Penal Code—reflects
common sense. Individuals can obstruct the process of
justice even when an investigation or proceeding is not
pending. For example, a murderer may threaten to kill a
witness if the witness reports information to the police.
Such an act is no less obstructive merely because the
government has yet to catch on and begin an investigation.
As the Solicitor General persuasively states, one can
obstruct the wheels of justice even before the wheels have
begun to move; indeed, obstruction of justice is often “most
effective” when it prevents “an investigation or proceeding
from commencing in the first place.” Brief for Attorney
General 15.
   Importantly, if an offense “relating to obstruction of
justice” under §1101(a)(43)(S) required that an
investigation or proceeding be pending, then many common
obstruction offenses would not qualify as aggravated
felonies under that provision. We decline to interpret
§1101(a)(43)(S) to exclude numerous heartland obstruction
offenses. “We should not lightly conclude that Congress
enacted a self-defeating statute.” Quarles v. United States,

, ___ (2019) (slip op., at 8); see also, e.g.,
Stokeling v. United States, 

, ___–___ (2019)
(slip op., at 7–8); Esquivel-Quintana, 

;
Voisine v. United States, 

, 695–696 (2016).
                      Cite as: 

 (2023)                      7

                           Opinion of the Court

   One final point bears emphasis: To the extent any doubt
remains about whether §1101(a)(43)(S) requires that an
investigation or proceeding be pending, the phrase “relating
to obstruction of justice” resolves the doubt. Cf. Mellouli v.
Lynch, 

, 811–812, n. 11 (2015). The phrase
“relating to” ensures that this statute covers offenses that
have “a connection with” obstruction of justice—which
surely covers common obstruction offenses that can occur
when an investigation or proceeding is not pending.
Coventry Health Care of Mo., Inc. v. Nevils, 

(2017) (internal quotation marks omitted). By contrast, in
defining certain other aggravated felonies in this statute,
Congress did not employ the broad phrase “relating to.”
See, e.g., 

(a)(43)(A) (“murder, rape, or
sexual abuse of a minor”).
   For all of those reasons, an offense “relating to
obstruction of justice” under §1101(a)(43)(S) does not
require that an investigation or proceeding be pending. 2


——————
  2 As interpreted by this Court, a few obstruction statutes require that

an investigation or proceeding be reasonably foreseeable. See, e.g.,
Marinello v. United States, 

, ___ (2018) (slip op., at 11).
Those decisions interpreted specific statutory language and did not rule
that obstruction offenses in general have a foreseeability requirement
(which would have been incorrect, in any event). Moreover, the Solicitor
General explains that offenses “relating to obstruction of justice” require
an intent to interfere with the legal process. See Tr. of Oral Arg. 6–8, 18,
116–117; Brief for Attorney General 23. That mens rea requirement
targets the same basic overbreadth concern as a foreseeability
requirement and ensures that §1101(a)(43)(S) will not sweep in offenses
that are not properly understood as offenses “relating to obstruction of
justice.” For example, the Solicitor General concedes that federal
misprision of felony is not an offense “relating to obstruction of justice”
because, in the Government’s view, the crime does not require an intent
to interfere with the legal process. See 

; Reply Brief for
Attorney General 26–27. In short, we see no justification for engrafting
a separate foreseeability requirement onto the broad and general
language of §1101(a)(43)(S).
8                   PUGIN v. GARLAND

                     Opinion of the Court

                             III
   Pugin and Cordero-Garcia offer four main arguments in
response. None is persuasive.
   First, Pugin and Cordero-Garcia point to 

(a), which among other things prohibits persons from
endeavoring “to influence, obstruct, or impede” the “due
administration of justice.” According to Pugin and Cordero-
Garcia, that specific prohibition requires that an
investigation or proceeding be pending. Cf. Pettibone v.
United States, 

 (1893). But even if they
are correct about that point, §1503(a) is only one
obstruction offense among the many obstruction offenses in
Title 18. And many federal obstruction offenses—like many
state obstruction offenses—proscribe obstruction when an
investigation or proceeding is not pending. Moreover, if
Congress wanted to define offenses “relating to obstruction
of justice” to have the same coverage as §1503(a), Congress
knew how to do so: Congress could have cross-referenced
§1503(a) in §1101(a)(43)(S) in the same way that Congress
cross-referenced numerous other statutes in §1101(a)(43).
See, e.g., §§1101(a)(43)(B)–(F). But Congress included no
such cross-reference to §1503(a) in §1101(a)(43)(S).
   Second, Pugin and Cordero-Garcia cite a few authorities
from the 1700s and 1800s and assert that obstruction of
justice historically required that an investigation or
proceeding be pending. But the historical record cited by
Pugin and Cordero-Garcia does not back up their broad
claim. See, e.g., 4 W. Blackstone, Commentaries on the
Laws of England 126 (1769) (explaining without
qualification that endeavoring “to dissuade a witness from
giving evidence” was an “impedimen[t] of justice”). More to
the point, as we have explained at length, the widespread
and contemporary understanding of obstruction of justice
at the time Congress enacted §1101(a)(43)(S) in 1996 did
not require that an investigation or proceeding be pending.
Cf. Taylor v. United States, 

 (1990).
                      Cite as: 

 (2023)                     9

                          Opinion of the Court

   Third, Pugin and Cordero-Garcia argue that offenses
“relating to obstruction of justice” require a pending
investigation or proceeding; otherwise, they maintain that
those offenses would be redundant with other offenses
covered by §1101(a)(43)(S)—in particular, offenses
“relating to . . . perjury or subornation of perjury, or bribery
of a witness.” But Pugin and Cordero-Garcia fail to explain
how requiring a pending investigation or proceeding for
obstruction offenses would resolve the claimed
redundancies with perjury or bribery offenses. After all,
perjury and bribery offenses often “relat[e] to obstruction of
justice.” In any event, “redundancies are common in
statutory drafting—sometimes in a congressional effort to
be doubly sure, sometimes because of congressional
inadvertence or lack of foresight, or sometimes simply
because of the shortcomings of human communication.”
Barton v. Barr, 

, ___ (2020) (slip op., at 16). As
a result, “the better overall reading of the statute”
sometimes “contains some redundancy.” Ibid.; Atlantic
Richfield Co. v. Christian, 

, ___, n. 5 (2020)
(slip op., at 10, n. 5); Rimini Street, Inc. v. Oracle USA, Inc.,

, ___ (2019) (slip op., at 11). Section
1101(a)(43) illustrates the point: Congress listed a large
number of offenses that would qualify as aggravated
felonies, likely to avoid unintended gaps. So it is not
surprising to find some overlap. To take one example, the
definition of “aggravated felony” covers “murder, rape, or
sexual abuse of a minor” and separately covers “crime[s] of
violence.” §§1101(a)(43)(A), (F). 3
——————
   3 The same point applies to §1101(a)(15)(U)(iii), which lists both

“obstruction of justice” and “witness tampering.” Neither Pugin nor
Cordero-Garcia cites that provision—presumably because the provision
appears in a different part of the statute and contains different language.
Moreover, Congress took the same belt-and-suspenders approach in
§1101(a)(15)(U)(iii) that it did in §1101(a)(43). See §1101(a)(15)(U)(iii)
(covering among other things “being held hostage; peonage; involuntary
10                     PUGIN v. GARLAND

                       Opinion of the Court

   Fourth, Pugin and Cordero-Garcia invoke the rule of
lenity. But even assuming that the rule of lenity can be
invoked in this particular civil immigration context, the
rule applies only if “after seizing everything from which aid
can be derived,” there remains “grievous ambiguity.”
Ocasio v. United States, 

 (2016)
(internal quotation marks omitted). Here, applying the
traditional tools of statutory interpretation, we have
concluded that an offense “relating to obstruction of justice”
does not require that an investigation or proceeding be
pending. So we have no basis for resorting to the rule of
lenity. See, e.g., Shaw v. United States, 

(2016); Salman v. United States, 

 (2016);
Abramski v. United States, 

, 188, n. 10 (2014);
cf. Kawashima v. Holder, 

 (2012).
                        *    *     *
  In sum, we conclude that an offense “relating to
obstruction of justice” under §1101(a)(43)(S) does not
require that an investigation or proceeding be pending. We
therefore disagree with the argument raised by Pugin and
Cordero-Garcia for excluding their obstruction offenses
from the broad coverage of §1101(a)(43)(S). We affirm the
judgment of the U. S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth
Circuit. We reverse the judgment of the U. S. Court of
Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and remand the case for
further proceedings consistent with this opinion.

                                                It is so ordered.




——————
servitude; slave trade; kidnapping; abduction; unlawful criminal
restraint; false imprisonment” as well as “any similar activity in
violation of Federal, State, or local criminal law”).
                  Cite as: 

 (2023)             1

                     JACKSON, J., concurring

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
                          _________________

                     Nos. 22–23 and 22–331
                          _________________


      JEAN FRANCOIS PUGIN, PETITIONER
22–23                v.
   MERRICK B. GARLAND, ATTORNEY GENERAL
 ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF
           APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT



   MERRICK B. GARLAND, ATTORNEY GENERAL,
                 PETITIONER
22–331                v.
  FERNANDO CORDERO-GARCIA, AKA FERNANDO
                  CORDERO
 ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF
            APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
                         [June 22, 2023]

   JUSTICE JACKSON, concurring.
   I agree with the Court that the Ninth Circuit wrongly em-
braced a pending-proceeding requirement when it assessed
what types of prior offenses qualify as “offense[s] relating
to obstruction of justice” under 

(a)(43)(S),
for purposes of determining the “aggravated felon[ies]” that
render noncitizens deportable, §1227(a)(2)(A)(iii). This
means, of course, that I also agree with the Court’s conclu-
sion that the Fourth Circuit rightly rejected any such pend-
ing-proceeding requirement.
   I write separately to highlight one (possibly sufficient)
reason why a predicate offense need not have a nexus to a
pending or ongoing investigation or judicial proceeding in
order to qualify as “an offense relating to obstruction of jus-
tice” within the meaning of this immigration statute. The
2                    PUGIN v. GARLAND

                    JACKSON, J., concurring

reason is that, when Congress inserted the phrase “offense
relating to obstruction of justice” into §1101(a)(43)(S), it
might well have been referencing a specific and previously
designated category of offenses—the offenses that are
grouped together in Chapter 73 of Title 18 of the U. S. Code,
under the heading “Obstruction of Justice.” 

,
codified at 

 et seq. And not all of the of-
fenses that are addressed in Chapter 73 contain a pending-
proceeding requirement.
                         *     *     *
   What counts as “an offense relating to obstruction of jus-
tice” within the meaning of §1101(a)(43)(S) is nothing more,
or less, than what Congress intended that phrase to mean
when it enacted that statute. The Immigration and Nation-
ality Act (INA) “does not expressly define” the phrase, so we
apply the “normal tools of statutory interpretation” to “ ‘see
what Congress probably meant’ ” by it. Esquivel-Quintana
v. Sessions, 

 (2017) (quoting Lopez v. Gon-
zales, 

 (2006)). In my view, our job in this
regard is a limited one: We are called upon to understand
and implement whatever Congress meant by that una-
dorned phrase.
   When Congress selected the words “offense relating to ob-
struction of justice” and inserted them into the INA in 1996,
110 Stat. 1277–1278, Congress’s longest standing and most
significant use of the phrase “obstruction of justice” in the
Statutes at Large was its description of Chapter 73 of Title
18 as concerning “obstruction of justice.” 

; see
also 

 (describing Chapter 73 as “relating to
obstruction of justice” when adding an offense to that Chap-
ter in 1990). To me, this is a powerful contextual clue that
Congress may have simply—and solely—been drawing on
its own existing understanding of which particular offenses
are properly characterized as such. Accord, Flores v. Attor-
ney General, 

, 287–289 (CA3 2017) (refusing
                  Cite as: 

 (2023)              3

                     JACKSON, J., concurring

to “look beyond Chapter 73” to “determine whether an al-
ien’s prior offense ‘relat[es] to obstruction of justice’ ” be-
cause §1101(a)(43)(S)’s “text . . . indicates Congress’s inten-
tion to reference Chapter 73”). In deciding the cases before
us, I would not want to rule out (even inadvertently) the
possibility that Chapter 73 is Congress’s actual benchmark
with respect to what qualifies as an “offense relating to ob-
struction of justice” for §1101(a)(43)(S) purposes, rather
than just a mere clue to some platonic, judicially divined
meaning of Congress’s chosen words.
   I believe that hewing closely to Congress’s will in this re-
gard is especially important where (as here) making the de-
termination of which offenses qualify implicates the “dras-
tic” deportation sanction. Jordan v. De George, 

 (1951). In our constitutional system, the Legisla-
ture makes legal policy judgments regarding the particular
circumstances that trigger the consequences that are asso-
ciated with criminal convictions. Accord, United States v.
Lanier, 

, and n. 5 (1997). And it seems at
least plausible that Congress’s description of certain “ag-
gravated felon[ies],” §1227(a)(2)(A)(iii), as “offense[s] relat-
ing to obstruction of justice,” §1101(a)(43)(S), may embody
its judgment to peg that subset of aggravated felonies to
Chapter 73, not an intent to leave the category without form
for future judicial refinement. Of course, if Congress has
already thus decided which obstruction-related convictions
so trigger the INA’s aggravated-felony provision, this Court
need not, and indeed should not, cobble together a “generic”
offense definition from nonstatutory sources (which risks
sweeping in offenses that Congress did not mean to cap-
ture).
   Here, the Court correctly emphasizes Chapter 73’s im-
portance in the course of analyzing whether a possible pred-
icate offense must have a nexus to a pending proceeding in
order to qualify as an aggravated felony. Ante, at 4. But
these parties have not fully ventilated the arguments for
4                       PUGIN v. GARLAND

                       JACKSON, J., concurring

and against the possibility that Chapter 73 might define (in
substance) the universe of offenses that “relat[e] to obstruc-
tion of justice,” §1101(a)(43)(S), as Congress meant that
phrase to be interpreted. Nor would running that issue to
ground here change the outcome.* As the Court notes, mul-
tiple Chapter 73 offenses require no pending proceeding.
§1512(f ); see also 102 Stat. 4397–4398 (1988 Congress de-
scribing an amendment to §1512 as an “obstruction of jus-
tice amendmen[t]” (boldface deleted)). That suffices to re-
solve the question before us even under a Chapter 73-
focused approach. The issue of whether such an approach
best tracks Congress’s intent can be reserved for future con-
sideration in a case where the parties joust in earnest on
the question.




——————
  *Before this Court, Pugin did not root his arguments in the Chapter
73-focused paradigm that I sketch here. I agree with the Court that the
arguments he did make do not require reversing the Fourth Circuit.
                  Cite as: 

 (2023)            1

                   SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
                          _________________

                     Nos. 22–23 and 22–331
                          _________________


      JEAN FRANCOIS PUGIN, PETITIONER
22–23                v.
   MERRICK B. GARLAND, ATTORNEY GENERAL
 ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF
           APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT



   MERRICK B. GARLAND, ATTORNEY GENERAL,
                 PETITIONER
22–331                v.
  FERNANDO CORDERO-GARCIA, AKA FERNANDO
                  CORDERO
 ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF
            APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
                         [June 22, 2023]

   JUSTICE SOTOMAYOR, with whom JUSTICE GORSUCH
joins, and with whom JUSTICE KAGAN joins as to all but
Part III, dissenting.
   From early American laws, to dictionaries, to modern fed-
eral and state obstruction statutes, interference with an on-
going investigation or proceeding is at the core of what it
means to be “an offense relating to obstruction of justice,” 

(a)(43)(S). The Court circumvents this ample
evidence only by casting a wide net and then throwing back
all but the bycatch. That approach “turns the categorical
approach on its head,” Esquivel-Quintana v. Sessions, 

 (2017), and subverts the commonly under-
stood meaning of “obstruction of justice” when Congress en-
acted §1101(a)(43)(S) in 1996. I respectfully dissent.
2                     PUGIN v. GARLAND

                    SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

                                I
   The Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) defines “ag-
gravated felony” by enumerating a long list of offenses.
§1101(a)(43). Some are federal criminal offenses, but oth-
ers are undefined generic offenses, such as “burglary,”
§1101(a)(43)(G), and “obstruction of justice,” §1101(a)
(43)(S), which is relevant here.
   To assess whether someone’s conviction is covered by a
generic offense, our precedents dictate that courts use the
“categorical approach.” Esquivel-Quintana, 

. That approach disregards facts about the conviction
and instead “compare[s] the elements of the statute forming
the basis of the defendant’s conviction with the elements of
the ‘generic’ crime—i.e., the offense as commonly under-
stood.” Descamps v. United States, 

(2013). If the elements of the underlying crime of conviction
are narrower than or the same as the elements of the ge-
neric offense, then there is a “categorical match,” Moncrieffe
v. Holder, 

 (2013), and the underlying of-
fense is an aggravated felony. If there is no categorical
match, then the conviction is not an aggravated felony, no
matter the underlying facts.
   Before a court can engage in this categorical comparison,
however, it must discern the “basic elements” of the rele-
vant “generic” offense. Taylor v. United States, 

 (1990). Courts accomplish this task by looking for
“evidence about the generic meaning” of the offense at the
time of the statute’s enactment. Esquivel-Quintana, 

. This means looking for the “generally ac-
cepted contemporary meaning” of the generic offense, while
setting aside more unusual “nongeneric” variants that are
“defin[ed] . . . more broadly.” Taylor, 

.
In Taylor, for example, this Court concluded, after survey-
ing various sources of meaning, that for purposes of 

(e), “generic burglary” encompasses any crime
                  Cite as: 

 (2023)              3

                    SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

“having the basic elements of unlawful or unprivileged en-
try into, or remaining in, a building or structure, with in-
tent to commit a crime.” 

. In reaching that
conclusion, the Court purposefully excluded burglary con-
victions in a handful of States that “defin[ed] burglary more
broadly” by “eliminating the requirement that the entry be
unlawful, or by including places, such as automobiles and
vending machines, other than buildings.” 

 Expanding
the definition to include those statutes would have strayed
too far from “the generic definition of bribery . . . intended
by Congress.” 

 (internal quotation marks omit-
ted).
   The question presented in these cases—whether “an of-
fense relating to obstruction of justice,” 

(a)
(43)(S), necessarily involves a pending investigation or pro-
ceeding—is a question about the “basic elements” of “ge-
neric” obstruction of justice. Taylor, 

. That
is, it is a question about how obstruction of justice was
“commonly understood,” Descamps, 

, in
1996 when Congress enacted §1101(a)(43)(S). Answering
that question requires focusing on the core, “generally ac-
cepted contemporary meaning,” Taylor, 

, of
obstruction of justice, rather than on more unusual “nonge-
neric” variants that are “define[d] . . . more broadly,” 

.
   The Court loses sight of this fundamental point. Instead
of focusing on whether a pending investigation or proceed-
ing is part of the heartland of obstruction of justice, it wan-
ders off into an array of obstruction-adjacent federal and
state laws that do not require a pending investigation or
proceeding. The Court then announces that those offenses
are core obstruction of justice, even though the evidence it
relies on, taken as a whole, reveals they are not. The result
is predictable. By defining offenses that do not require a
pending investigation or proceeding as core obstruction of
justice, the majority forces through the conclusion that a
4                     PUGIN v. GARLAND

                    SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

pending investigation or proceeding is not required to qual-
ify as generic obstruction of justice.
   A reexamination of the sources relied upon by the major-
ity, with the appropriate focus on discerning the trunk of
obstruction of justice, rather than its various branches or
offshoots, leads to the opposite result: To qualify as “an of-
fense relating to obstruction of justice” under §1101(a)
(43)(S), a predicate offense must require a pending investi-
gation or proceeding.
                                A
   As an initial matter, the majority glosses over the critical
fact that “obstruction of justice” was an established term of
art at the time of §1101(a)(43)(S)’s enactment in 1996. This
is a major first misstep because “[w]here Congress employs
a term of art obviously transplanted from another legal
source, it brings the old soil with it.” George v. McDonough,

, ___ (2022) (slip op., at 5) (internal quotation
marks omitted).
   From the “old soil” until today, “obstruction of justice” has
required a pending investigation or proceeding. In 1831,
Congress forbade efforts “to influence, intimidate, or im-
pede any juror, witness, or officer, in any court of the United
States, in the discharge of his duty” or “to obstruct or im-
pede, the due administration of justice therein.” Act of Mar.
2, 1831, ch. 99, 

 (emphasis added). This provi-
sion, which became §5399 of the Revised Statutes, see Rev.
Stat., Title 70, ch. 4, §5399 (1875), laid “the foundation for
the modern statutory incarnation of the offense of obstruc-
tion of justice.” E. Murphy, Manufacturing Crime: Process,
Pretext, and Criminal Justice, 97 Geo. L. J. 1435, 1473
(2009).
   In Pettibone v. United States, 

 (1893), this
Court confirmed that §5399 required a pending proceeding.
After describing the law as criminalizing “obstruction of the
due administration of justice in any court of the United
                  Cite as: 

 (2023)             5

                    SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

States,” the Court explained that “such obstruction can only
arise when justice is being administered.” 

. “Un-
less that fact exists, the statutory offense cannot be com-
mitted.” 

 The Court thus tied obstruction of justice
under §5399 to “the pendency of proceedings in the United
States court, or the progress of the administration of justice
therein.” Id., at 205.
   Section 5399 is the predecessor of the modern omnibus or
catchall obstruction of justice clause, which is codified at 

, and which prohibits endeavoring “to influ-
ence, obstruct, or impede, the due administration of jus-
tice.” In recognition of this through line, this Court held,
just a year before the enactment of §1101(a)(43)(S), that “a
person lacking knowledge of a pending proceeding” cannot
be convicted under §1503. United States v. Aguilar, 

 (1995) (citing Pettibone, 

).
Underscoring this point in his partial concurrence, Justice
Scalia explained that “an endeavor to obstruct proceedings
that did not exist would not violate the statute” because “ob-
struction can only arise when justice is being adminis-
tered.” 

 (alteration and internal quo-
tation marks omitted).
   Congress was aware of this settled interpretation of
§1503 when it added “obstruction of justice” to the INA’s list
of aggravated felonies. See Guerrero-Lasprilla v. Barr, 

, ___ (2020) (slip op., at 10) (“We normally assume
that Congress is aware of relevant judicial precedent when
it enacts a new statute” (internal quotation marks omit-
ted)). In fact, by 1996 Congress had already demonstrated
that “relating to obstruction of justice” was understood to
capture §1503. Enacted in 1970, the Racketeer Influenced
and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) specifically lists as
a predicate offense “section 1503 (relating to obstruction of
justice).” 

(1). Moreover, this language,
just like the language at §1101(a)(43)(S), serves the purpose
of identifying one of a long list of underlying offenses to
6                         PUGIN v. GARLAND

                        SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

which an overarching statute applies. Thus, by 1996, Con-
gress had used the same phrase for the same purpose to re-
fer to §1503. In fact, the INA’s list of aggravated felonies
explicitly cross-references RICO, suggesting Congress was
well aware of the parallel. See §1101(a)(43)(J) (INA listing
RICO violation as an aggravated felony). 1
  In short, in searching for the heartland of obstruction of
justice, the omnibus clause of §1503 and the history from
which it is derived are invaluable touchstones. Neither
countenances an obstruction of justice offense separate
from a pending investigation or proceeding. 2
                              B
    Even setting this crucial historical evidence aside, and

——————
   1 The majority argues that if Congress had wanted offenses “relating

to obstruction of justice” to “have the same coverage as §1503(a),” then
Congress could have just “cross-referenced §1503(a) in §1101(a)(43)(S).”
Ante., at 8. This argument misses the point entirely. If Congress had
done that, then only persons convicted under §1503 would qualify. Con-
gress’s use of the generic “obstruction of justice,” however, clearly signals
that Congress wanted other state and federal offenses sharing the same
basic elements to be included as well. Section 1503 is a strong indicator
of the generic meaning of “obstruction of justice” in §1101(a)(43)(S), not
its equivalent.
   2 Although the Court quotes Blackstone’s statement that “ ‘dis-

suad[ing] a witness from giving evidence’ ” was an “ ‘impedimen[t] of jus-
tice’ ” in support of its position, ante, at 8, Blackstone actually supports
this dissent. The Court ignores that in historical usage “giving evidence”
meant “testifying” at a proceeding. See, e.g., 3 W. Blackstone, Commen-
taries on the Laws of England 305 (1768) (“[E]very defence, which cannot
be thus specially pleaded, may be given in evidence, upon the general
issue at the trial”); 2 M. Hale, History of the Pleas of the Crown 280
(1736) (“If a reward be promised to a person for giving his evidence before
he gives it, this, if proved, disables his testimony”). The majority also
ignores that the Blackstone passage is discussing “[c]ontempts against
the king’s . . . courts of justice.” 4 Blackstone, Commentaries, at 124
(1769). This context confirms Blackstone is referring to impeding a wit-
ness from testifying at a proceeding, because otherwise it would not be a
contempt against the king’s courts.
                      Cite as: 

 (2023)                     7

                       SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

proceeding as the Court does, by looking to dictionary defi-
nitions, chapter 73 of the Federal Criminal Code, state stat-
utes, and the Model Penal Code, the same result emerges:
Core obstruction of justice requires a pending investigation
or proceeding.
                                1
   Begin with the central dictionary definition upon which
the Court relies. It defines obstruction of justice as “the
crime or act of willfully interfering with the process of justice
and law esp. by influencing, threatening, harming, or im-
peding a witness, potential witness, juror, or judicial or le-
gal officer or by furnishing false information in or otherwise
impeding an investigation or legal process.” Merriam-Web-
ster’s Dictionary of Law 337 (1996) (emphasis added).
   While the Court claims that this definition omits any re-
quirement of a pending investigation or proceeding, ante, at
4, the two italicized phrases say otherwise. “[I]nterference”
means the “act of meddling in or hampering an activity or
process,” Webster’s Third New International Dictionary
1178 (1993), while “impede” means “to interfere with or get
in the way of the progress of ” something or someone, 

. The definition is clear that the process that is med-
dled in, or interfered with, is the “process of justice and law”
or “an investigation or legal process.” 3
   For the same reason, the majority is too hasty when it
asserts that the definition encompasses acts separate from
a pending investigation or proceeding. That definition ends
with the phrase “in . . . an investigation or legal process.”
——————
   3 While it is possible to talk about interfering with or impeding a pro-

cess before it has even begun, those phrases more naturally connote an
effect on a process that is ongoing. For example, talk of interfering in a
hiring process strongly suggests that hiring-related activities are already
underway. Certainly where an upcoming hiring is not even foreseeable,
it would be unusual to talk of such inference. Yet, the majority does not
require even a foreseeable investigation or proceeding in order for there
to be obstruction of justice. See ante, at 7, n. 2.
8                     PUGIN v. GARLAND

                    SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

Under the series-qualifier canon, that phrase is best read
to modify all listed verbs, especially because the definition
lists each action as an example of “the crime or act of will-
fully interfering with the process of justice and law.” See
Facebook, Inc. v. Duguid, 

, ___ (2021) (slip op.,
at 5) (“[W]hen there is a straightforward, parallel construc-
tion that involves all nouns or verbs in a series, a modifier
at the end of the list normally applies to the entire series”
(internal quotation marks omitted)). Thus, far from favor-
ing the majority’s view, the definition most naturally sup-
ports the conclusion that interference with a pending inves-
tigation or proceeding is an element of generic obstruction
of justice.
   The other dictionary definitions upon which the Court re-
lies similarly indicate the need for a pending investigation
or proceeding. The majority notes that Black’s Law Diction-
ary defines obstruction of justice to cover “ ‘obstructing the
administration of justice in any way,’ ” ante, at 4, but over-
looks the fact that “administration of justice,” both histori-
cally and currently, refers to court proceedings. See, e.g., 1
J. Kent, Commentaries on American Law *290 (“[T]he judi-
ciary power is intrusted with the administration of justice”);
Black’s Law Dictionary 53 (10th ed. 2014) (defining “due
administration of justice” as “[t]he proper functioning and
integrity of a court or other tribunal and the proceedings
before it”). Similarly, the full definition from A Dictionary
of Modern Legal Usage mentions “interference with the or-
derly administration of law.” B. Garner, p. 611 (2d ed.
1995). The cited definitions thus all weigh against the ma-
jority’s sweeping view, and in favor of the view that obstruc-
tion of justice “can only arise when justice is being admin-
istered.” Pettibone, 

.
                                2
   The federal offenses listed in chapter 73 of Title 18, which
is entitled “Obstruction of Justice,” provide further support
                      Cite as: 

 (2023)                     9

                       SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

for the conclusion that core obstruction of justice requires
the administration of justice.
   When Congress codified chapter 73 in 1948, the chapter
contained six provisions, each of which requires a connec-
tion to a pending proceeding or investigation. See Act of
June 25, 1948, §§1501–1506, 62 Stat. 769–770. The central
provision is §1503, with its omnibus or catchall prohibition
against endeavoring “to influence, obstruct, or impede, the
due administration of justice.” As already explained, supra,
at 5, it is undisputed that §1503’s omnibus clause requires
a pending proceeding. The same is true for the other five
provisions, all of which either refer to ongoing legal pro-
cesses or cover conduct that can arise only during legal pro-
ceedings. 4
   By the time Congress passed 

(a)(43)(S) in
1996, Congress had added nine narrower, more specific of-
fenses to the six original offenses (§§1501–1506) in chapter
73. See 18 U. S. C. §§1507–1513, 1516–1517. 5 While it is
less clear that those specialized provisions fall within the
heartland of obstruction of justice, even the vast majority of
them require a connection to a proceeding or investigation. 6

——————
  4 The five other original chapter 73 offenses are §1501 (“Assault on pro-

cess server”); §1502 (“Resistance to extradition agent”); §1504 (“Influenc-
ing juror by writing”); §1505 (“Influencing or injuring witness before
agencies and committees”); and §1506 (“Theft or alteration of record or
process; false bail”). These provisions remain in chapter 73 to this day,
with only modest revisions that do not change the need for a pending
investigation or proceeding.
  5 §31(a), 

 (adding §1507 in 1950); §1, 

 (adding

§1508 in 1956); §101, 

 (adding §1509 in 1960); Pub. L. 90–123,
§1(a), 

 (adding §1510 in 1967); §802(a), 

 (adding
§1511 in 1970); §4(a), 

 (adding §1512 in 1982); id., at 1250
(adding §1513 in 1982); §7078(a), 

 (adding §1516 in 1988);
§2503(a), 

 (adding §1517 in 1990).
  6 The two exceptions are §§1511 and 1512. Section 1511 is a special-

ized provision, enacted as part of the Organized Crime Control Act of
1970, §802, 

, which prohibits “conspir[ing] to obstruct the
10                        PUGIN v. GARLAND

                        SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

See §1507 (“picket[ing] or parad[ing]” with the intent to in-
terfere with “the administration of justice”); §1508 (listen-
ing to or recording jury “deliberat[ions] or voting”); §1510
(interference with reports of information “to a criminal in-
vestigator”); §1516 (interfering with a “Federal auditor in
the performance of official duties”); §1509 (interfering with
“due exercise of rights” under a court order); §1513 (retali-
ating against a witness for participating in “an official pro-
ceeding”).
   The primary outlier amongst the more recent additions
to chapter 73 is §1512, which criminalizes tampering with
a witness, victim, or informant. As the majority notes, that
provision provides that “[f]or purposes of this section . . . an
official proceeding need not be pending or about to be insti-
tuted at the time of the offense.” §1512(f )(1). Instead of
favoring the majority’s conclusion, however, §1512 is the ex-
ception that proves the rule. There would be no need to
clarify that the provision applies absent a pending proceed-
ing unless there were an established background under-
standing that obstruction of justice requires such a proceed-
ing. 7 Because the question at hand concerns the meaning
of heartland obstruction of justice, excluding “nongeneric”
variants “defin[ed] . . . more broadly,” Taylor, 

, what matters here is the general rule, not a singular
exception to it. To use a lighthearted example, it is clear
that the “generic” meaning of “mammal” includes giving
——————
enforcement of the criminal laws of a State . . . with the intent to facili-
tate an illegal gambling business.” 

(a). Given that
§1511 is a specialized conspiracy provision intended to “discourage orga-
nized crime’s corruption of state and local officials for the purpose of fa-
cilitating gambling enterprises,” Iannelli v. United States, 

 (1975), it has no bearing on core obstruction of justice. Section 1512
is discussed infra, at 10–11.
   7 In a testament to the gravitational force of the weighty background

rule that a pending proceeding is generally required, this Court has in-
terpreted §1512 to at least require a foreseeable proceeding. See Arthur
Andersen LLP v. United States, 

, 707–708 (2005).
                      Cite as: 

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                        SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

birth to live young, even though the platypus is an excep-
tion to that rule. Section 1512 thus proves the opposite of
what the majority takes it to prove. 8
   The Court instead reasons that because §1512 does not
require a pending investigation or proceeding, the answer
to the question “Does generic obstruction of justice require
a pending investigation or proceeding?” must be “No.” That
line of thinking, however, simply assumes that §1512 falls
within generic obstruction (it assumes the platypus is
heartland mammalia). In so assuming, the Court loses
sight of the task at hand, which is, again, to answer a ques-
tion about the trunk of obstruction of justice, not more
broadly defined offshoots. See Descamps, 

.
All signs point toward treating §1512 as just such an off-
shoot, at least insofar as it explicitly chooses to dispose with
the requirement that a proceeding “be pending or about to
be instituted at the time of the offense.” §1512(f )(1).
                              3
  The text of the INA itself confirms that Congress did not
understand obstruction of justice to encompass all witness
——————
   8 The majority also mentions §1518 (Obstruction of criminal investiga-

tions of health care offenses) and §1519 (Destruction, alteration, or falsi-
fication of records in federal investigations and bankruptcy), which were
enacted after Congress passed §1101(a)(43)(S). See §245(a), 

 (adding §1518 in 1996); §802(a), 

 (adding §1519 in
2002). Both are highly “specialized” provisions concerned with “corpo-
rate fraud and financial audits.” Yates v. United States, 

,
541 (2015) (plurality opinion). Given that these later enacted offenses
are specialized extensions of obstruction of justice, they are irrelevant to
determining what Congress in 1996 understood as the generic meaning
of “obstruction of justice” in §1101(a)(43)(S). While the concurrence sug-
gests that “obstruction of justice” is coextensive with chapter 73, ante, at
2–3 (opinion of JACKSON, J.), the concurrence (like the majority) does not
engage with these issues regarding §§1518 and 1519, nor with the prob-
lems noted above about §§1511 and 1512, see supra, at 9–11, even though
all of these issues have been thoroughly ventilated in these cases. See
Brief for Petitioner in No. 22–23, pp. 23–29; Brief for Respondent in No.
22–331, pp. 15–21; Brief for Attorney General 24–31.
12                       PUGIN v. GARLAND

                       SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

tampering. In the very same subsection of the INA at issue
here, Congress expressly used the term “witness tamper-
ing” separately from “obstruction of justice.” 

(a)(15)(U)(iii). Specifically, in a set of provisions de-
fining “U” nonimmigrant status, 9 Congress again enumer-
ated a list of offenses, many of which overlap with the ag-
gravated felonies in §1101(a)(43). See §1101(a)(15)(U)(iii);
cf. §§1101(a)(43). Just as it did for aggravated felonies,
Congress included “obstruction of justice” in the list. This
time, however, Congress added witness tampering in addi-
tion to obstruction of justice by listing “witness tampering;
obstruction of justice; [or] perjury” as distinct offenses.
§1101(a)(15)(U)(iii); cf. §1101(a)(43)(S) (“obstruction of jus-
tice, perjury or subornation of perjury, or bribery of a wit-
ness”).
   The Court’s broad interpretation of “obstruction of jus-
tice,” which swallows up all witness tampering, cannot be
reconciled with this statutory text. If, on the one hand, the
Court applies the same broad meaning to “obstruction of
justice” in §1101(a)(15)(U)(iii), then “witness tampering”
becomes redundant, in violation of the canon that statutes
should be read “so as to avoid rendering superfluous any
parts thereof.” Astoria Fed. Sav. & Loan Assn. v. Solimino,

 (1991). If, on the other hand, the Court
attempts to avoid this problem by interpreting “obstruction
of justice” differently across the two provisions, then it vio-
lates “the established canon of construction that similar
language contained within the same section of a statute
must be accorded a consistent meaning.” National Credit
Union Admin. v. First Nat. Bank & Trust Co., 

 (1998). Either way, the Court’s interpretation fails.
   Although §1101(a)(43)(S) refers to “an offense relating to

——————
  9 Persons eligible for “U” nonimmigrant status are victims of certain

qualifying criminal activity who are helpful to officials investigating or
prosecuting such activity. See 

(a)(15)(U)(i).
                  Cite as: 

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                    SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

obstruction of justice,” while §1101(a)(15)(U)(iii) refers to
“criminal activity . . . involving . . . obstruction of justice”
“or any similar activity,” these textual differences only re-
inforce that Congress understood “obstruction of justice”
and “witness tampering” to have quite different ordinary
meanings. Given that §1101(a)(15)(U)(iii) covers not just
“obstruction of justice” but “any similar activity,” one must
infer that Congress took witness tampering to be not only
distinct from obstruction of justice, but distinct enough to
need separate mention from “obstruction of justice” “or any
similar activity.”
   Nor does it matter that §1101(a)(15)(U) was added to the
INA in 2000 as part of the Victims of Trafficking and Vio-
lence Protection Act. 

. On the contrary, the
fact that Congress understood “obstruction of justice” to be
distinct from “witness tampering” just four years after en-
acting §1101(a)(43)(S) is good evidence Congress under-
stood the same to be true in 1996, when it deemed “obstruc-
tion of justice” an aggravated felony under the INA. After
all, “no one here suggests that the ordinary understanding
in the years after 1996 somehow differed from the ordinary
understanding in 1996.” Ante, at 5, n. 1.
                               4
   State law points to the same result as the other indicia of
meaning examined thus far. State law is relevant because,
in discerning the generic meaning of terms with common-
law roots, the Court will often survey state statutes in effect
at the time the federal statute in question was enacted. See
Taylor, 495 U. S., at 598–599 (considering how “burglary”
was understood “in the criminal codes of most States”).
Here, when §1101(a)(43)(S) was enacted in 1996, 13 States
and the District of Columbia had a crime deemed “obstruc-
tion of ” or “obstructing” “justice.” The majority of those
state statutes (eight in total) required a connection to an
investigation or proceeding that was pending, or at least
14                        PUGIN v. GARLAND

                        SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

reasonably foreseeable, while the remainder were ambigu-
ous on the matter. 10 Thus, when §1101(a)(43)(S) was added
to the INA in 1996, obstruction of justice “ ‘generally’ ” or
“ ‘typically’ ” required such a connection. Id., at 598.
    The majority avoids this conclusion only by, once again,
adopting a circular approach. In analyzing state law, the
majority looks exclusively to state witness tampering stat-
utes, which it simply assumes are “state obstruction of-
fenses.” Ante, at 5. It then concludes that because many of
those statutes do not require a pending investigation or pro-
ceeding, neither does obstruction of justice under the INA.
Ibid. As should be clear by now, that method gets the cate-
gorical approach backward; if the overarching federal cate-
gory is assumed to include the state offenses in question,
there will always be a categorical match. One cannot prove
that all state witness tampering laws fall within the INA’s
“relating to obstruction of justice” simply by assuming that
they do. 11
——————
   10 See Haw. Rev. Stat. §710–1072.5 (1996) (connection required); La.

Rev. Stat. Ann. §14:130.1 (West 1996) (same); Md. Ann. Code, Art. 27,
§26 (1996) (same); Miss. Code Ann. §97–9–55 (1996) (same); 

.2–460 (1996) (same); Vt. Stat. Ann., Tit. 13, §3015 (1996)
(same); W. Va. Code Ann. §61–5–27 (1996) (same); 

(1996) (same); Ind. Code Ann. §35–44–3–4 (ambiguous); 

 (1996) (same); Utah Code Ann. §76–8–306 (1996) (same);
D. C. Code §22–722 (1996) (same); Ill. Comp. Stat., ch. 720, §5/31–4
(1996) (same); Mont. Code Ann. §45–7–303 (1996) (same).
   11 Moreover, even assuming state witness tampering statutes are rele-

vant, it is noteworthy that in 1996 the vast majority of States (39 in total)
categorized their witness tampering statutes as something other than
“obstruction of justice.” See, e.g., Ala. Code §13A–10–124 (1996) (catego-
rized under “Offenses Against Public Administration”); Colo. Rev. Stat.
§18–8–707 (1996) (categorized under “Offenses—Governmental Opera-
tions”); Idaho Code Ann. §18–2604 (1996) (categorized under “Evidence
Falsified or Concealed and Witnesses Intimidated or Bribed”); see also
Brief for Respondent in No. 22–331, pp. 26–28 (collecting statutes). Of
the remaining 11 States that located their witness tampering statutes in
the part of the Criminal Code prohibiting “obstructing” or “obstruction”
of “justice,” at least 7 required a connection to a pending investigation or
                     Cite as: 

 (2023)                  15

                      SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

   The majority also relies on the Model Penal Code (MPC).
Ante, at 5–6. Although the MPC sometimes can provide
supplemental evidence of generic meaning, see Taylor, 

, it is critical to bear in mind that the MPC
is fundamentally a “reform movemen[t].” United States v.
Bailey, 

 (1980). Where that reform in-
volves a definitive break from the state of the law at the
time in question, the MPC is of limited value in discerning
generic meaning. Such is the case here. The MPC eschews
any talk of “obstruction of justice,” and instead sets out a
series of articles under the heading “Offenses Against Pub-
lic Administration.” ALI, MPC §§240–243 (1980). Those
articles cover many offenses, such as escape from prison
(§242.6), perjury (§241.1), and bribery (§240.1) that are
clearly not generic obstruction of justice (indeed, perjury
and bribery are listed separately from obstruction of justice
in §1101(a)(43)(S)). Even in the article that most closely
parallels traditional obstruction of justice (§242.1 “Ob-
structing Administration of Law or Other Governmental
Function”), the MPC gave the word “ ‘obstructs’ ” an “expan-
sive meaning,” §242.1, Comment 2, at 203, and “intended”
for the offense described to “reach all legitimate activities
of government,” not just “the administration of justice,” id.,
at 203–204. Because of these departures, which have not
been widely adopted, the MPC carries little weight for pur-
poses of discerning the core that forms generic obstruction
of justice.
   Despite these issues, the majority focuses, again without
justification, on the MPC’s description of witness tampering

——————
proceeding. See Ind. Code Ann. §35–44–3–4(a)(1); Md. Ann. Code, Art.
27, §26; Miss. Code Ann. §97–9–55; 

 (1996);
N. C. Gen. Stat. Ann. §14–266 (1996); Vt. Stat. Ann., Tit. 13, §3015; W.
Va. Code Ann. §61–5–27. State law on the whole thus favors a pending
investigation or proceeding requirement for generic obstruction of jus-
tice.
16                    PUGIN v. GARLAND

                    SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

(§241.6). See ante, at 6. Even setting aside the now-famil-
iar circularity of this reasoning, this definition does not help
the majority either. In describing witness tampering, the
MPC reformers chose to depart from “laws requiring that a
proceeding or investigation actually be pending,” §241.6,
Comment 2, at 166, by requiring only a “belie[f] that an of-
ficial proceeding or investigation is pending or about to be
instituted,” §241.6(1) (emphasis added). That intentional
departure is reason alone to treat this MPC description
with caution when articulating generic obstruction of jus-
tice. Yet, the majority goes much further than the MPC
reformers by dismissing the notion that at least a foreseea-
ble investigation or proceeding should be required. See
ante, at 7, n. 2. That statement by the Court reflects just
how far afield it has wandered from the heartland of ob-
struction of justice.
   Perhaps sensing the weakness of its evidence, the Court
falls back on the Government’s “commonsense point,” Reply
Brief 4, that “one can obstruct the wheels of justice even
before the wheels have begun to move,” ante, at 6. Yet the
intuitive idea that “obstruction can only arise when justice
is being administered,” Pettibone, 

, finds
support in common sense to at least the same degree. But
while both formulations find some support in common
sense, the same cannot be said regarding other clues about
generic meaning. Considered together, the relevant his-
tory, dictionaries, and federal and state laws provide pow-
erful evidence that obstruction of justice “as commonly un-
derstood,” Descamps, 

, when Congress
enacted 

(a)(43)(S) in 1996, requires a pend-
ing investigation or proceeding.
                             II
  In a feeble attempt to shore up its argument, the Court
resorts to a seemingly limitless construction of “relating to
obstruction of justice,” §1101(a)(43)(S), according to which
                  Cite as: 

 (2023)             17

                    SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

the phrase “relating to” covers all offenses “that have ‘a con-
nection with’ obstruction of justice,” ante, at 7. That read-
ing is a direct result of the Court’s failure to consider stat-
utory text and context when interpreting “relating to.”
After all, “in isolation” that phrase is endlessly expansive
because, absent a statute-specific “limiting principle,” rela-
tions “stop nowhere.” Maracich v. Spears, 

, 59–
60 (2013) (internal quotation marks omitted). Here, one
look at statutory text and context confirms that “relating
to” must have a narrower meaning.
   The text of the INA “makes [non-U. S. citizens] remova-
ble based on the nature of their convictions, not based on
their actual conduct.” Esquivel-Quintana, 

.
This explains why, when applying §1101(a)(43)(S), courts
use the categorical approach, which compares the elements
of the statute of conviction to the generic offense. Without
a delineated generic offense, however, this comparison fal-
ters. The Court’s nebulous reading of “relating to obstruc-
tion of justice, perjury or subornation of perjury, or bribery
of a witness,” §1101(a)(43)(S) (emphasis added), fails to
grapple with this reality. Rather than ask whether a con-
viction is a categorical match for, say, generic “perjury,” the
majority seems to suggest courts should ask if the convic-
tion has “a connection with” generic perjury. If that is what
the majority intends, it is not clear what that question
means or how courts should go about answering it.
   In contrast, no such problem arises if “an offense relating
to . . . perjury” or “an offense relating to obstruction of jus-
tice” is understood narrowly to mean simply “an offense
qualifying as generic perjury” or “an offense qualifying as
generic obstruction of justice.” The broader statutory con-
text confirms this reading. Again and again, §1101(a)(43)
uses the phrase “relating to” in descriptive parentheticals
to introduce an ordinary language description of other ag-
gravated felonies. For example, to identify the money laun-
dering offenses in 

, the INA refers to “an
18                    PUGIN v. GARLAND

                    SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

offense described in section 1956 of title 18 (relating to laun-
dering of money instruments).” §1101(a)(43)(D) (emphasis
added). This structure, which the INA repeats well over a
dozen times, see §§1101(a)(43)(D)–(E),(H)–(N), confirms
that the phrase “relating to” is used in the INA simply to
introduce (not expand upon) a general description of the in-
tended crime category.
   The Court’s seemingly expansive reading of “in relation
to” is also refuted by its consequences for the statutory text.
If all that is required is a “connection with” something that
“obstruct[s] the wheels of justice,” ante, at 6–7, then the
Government has open season to argue that all sorts of
crimes that hinder law enforcement (e.g., failing to report a
crime) or make detection of a crime more difficult (e.g.,
money laundering) qualify as offenses “relating to obstruc-
tion of justice.” On this approach, certain other aggravated
felonies listed in the INA (e.g., §1101(a)(43)(D) (money
laundering)) will collapse into “obstruction of justice,” lead-
ing to substantial superfluity in the statute. Indeed, the
separate categories of perjury and bribery of a witness
listed in the very same subparagraph, §1101(a)(43)(S), will
themselves be part of that collapse.
   More importantly, an expansive reading of “in relation to”
opens the door for the Government to argue that many low-
level offenses that fall outside of core obstruction of justice
are “aggravated” felonies, even though the INA reserves
that label for “especially egregious felonies.” Esquivel-
Quintana, 581 U. S., at 394. For example, misdemeanor
convictions for failing to report a crime, presenting false
identification to an officer, refusing to aid a police officer,
leaving the scene of a crime, or purchasing a fake ID could
be taken to count as “relating to obstruction of justice.” See
Brief for National Immigrant Justice Center et al. as Amici
                      Cite as: 

 (2023)                      19

                        SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

Curiae 10–25 (collecting offenses). 12
  This significant potential for “redundancy,” “unfairness,”
and “arbitrary” enforcement should have led the Court to
“exercise interpretive restraint,” Marinello v. United
States, 

, ___, ___ (2018) (slip op., at 7, 9) (inter-
nal quotation marks omitted), when construing “relating
to.” Indeed, the many problems with an expansive reading
of “relating to” raise the question whether the Court even
really intends to adopt such a reading, especially because
the relevant discussion occupies a single paragraph. Per-
haps instead the Court simply offers up “connection with”
as a synonym for “relating to,” leaving it for lower courts to
settle what that phrase actually means.
                              III
   While the evidence assembled here is far stronger than
any offered by the majority, the sheer complexity of the task
at hand leaves lingering ambiguity, even if the Court claims
it does not see it. Cf. ante, at 10. To the extent doubts re-
main, however, they are resolved in favor of a narrower un-
derstanding of §1101(a)(43)(S) by the “longstanding princi-
ple of construing any lingering ambiguities in deportation
statutes in favor of the [non-U. S. citizen].” INS v. Cardoza-
Fonseca, 

 (1987).
   This Court resolves doubts in favor of the non-U. S. citi-
zen in keeping with the general rule that ambiguities in pe-
nal statutes should be construed against the government.
——————
  12 Of course, many of the convictions the Government seeks to shoe-

horn into “obstruction of justice” are serious offenses, even if they are not
a categorical match for obstruction of justice. Such convictions, however,
may render non-U. S. citizens removable for other reasons (e.g., if they
qualify as crimes involving moral turpitude). Moreover, when nonciti-
zens are removable, any discretionary immigration relief for which they
may be eligible will “depen[d] upon the discretion of the Attorney Gen-
eral.” Carachuri-Rosendo v. Holder, 

 (2010). Thus,
any difference between the majority and the dissent in terms of “practical
effect on policing our Nation’s borders . . . is a limited one.” 

20                    PUGIN v. GARLAND

                    SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

After all, deportation is not only a kind of “penalty,” but a
“drastic measure” often “the equivalent of banishment [or]
exile.” Fong Haw Tan v. Phelan, 

 (1948). No-
where is that truer than here. Aggravated felonies under
the INA are “a category of crimes singled out for the harsh-
est deportation consequences.”          Carachuri-Rosendo v.
Holder, 

 (2010). If a non-U. S. citizen is
convicted of an aggravated felony, even if she has a green
card and has lived in this country for years, she is subject
to removal and is also ineligible for readmission and many
forms of immigration relief. See 

(b)(2),
1182(a)(9)(A), 1182(h), 1227(a)(2)(A)(iii), 1229b(a)(3),
1229c(a)(1). “Accordingly, removal is a virtually certainty
for [a non-U. S. citizen] found to have an aggravated felony
conviction, no matter how long he has previously resided
here.” Sessions v. Dimaya, 

, ___–___ (2018)
(slip op., at 1–2). Moreover, a person convicted of an “ag-
gravated felony” faces heighted criminal sanctions for diso-
beying orders of removal, §1253(a)(1), or reentering the
United States without permission, §1326(b)(2). For exam-
ple, the penalty for illegal reentry skyrockets from 2 years
to 20. See §§1326(a), (b)(2).
   This Court has been clear that, in the face of such stakes,
it “will not assume that Congress meant to trench on [a non-
U. S. citizen’s] freedom beyond that which is required by
the narrowest of several possible meanings of the words
used.” Fong Haw Tan, 

. While it may be
true that certain broader readings of “obstruction of justice”
are “at least plausible,” ante, at 3 (JACKSON, J., concurring),
that is not good enough because it is, at the very minimum,
at least equally plausible that “obstruction of justice” re-
quires a pending investigation or proceeding. The Court
should have “err[ed] on the side of underinclusiveness”
when interpreting §1101(a)(43). Moncrieffe, 

.
                   Cite as: 

 (2023)             21

                    SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

                               IV
   By rejecting a central feature of core obstruction of justice
and adopting a seemingly expansive reading of “relating
to,” the Court leaves generic obstruction of justice without
any discernible shape. The Court thus injects further chaos
into the already fraught question of how to understand
§1101(a)(43)(S) and opens the door for the Government to
try to use that provision as a catchall for all sorts of criminal
activity, whether aggravated or not.
   The Court could perhaps have reined in some of that
chaos by giving “obstruction of justice” affirmative shape
and boundaries in other ways, but it makes no effort to do
so. Instead, the Court simply rejects the legal proposition
that a pending investigation or proceeding is required for a
predicate offense to qualify under §1101(a)(43)(S). At bot-
tom, its reasoning in support of that conclusion boils down
to a simple syllogism, which it clothes in various guises: (1)
Dissuading a witness from reporting a crime to the police
qualifies as obstruction of justice; (2) the offense of dissuad-
ing a witness from reporting a crime does not require a
pending investigation or proceeding; thus (3) some offense
qualifying as obstruction of justice does not require a pend-
ing investigation or proceeding.
   The flaw in this syllogism is, of course, premise (1). By
assuming, up front and without reason, that dissuading a
witness from reporting a crime qualifies as obstruction of
justice, the Court oversteps. Congress could, if it wanted,
add witness tampering to the INA’s lengthy list of aggra-
vated felonies, just as it did with the list of offenses at
§1101(a)(15)(U)(iii), but it has not done so. The Court’s de-
cision today makes that judgment call for Congress. “Our
license to interpret statutes does not include the power to
engage in such freewheeling judicial policymaking.”
Pereida v. Wilkinson, 

, ___ (2021) (slip op., at
16).
22                        PUGIN v. GARLAND

                        SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

  The syllogism’s conclusion is also noteworthy for its nar-
rowness. In the end, all the Court really holds is that ge-
neric obstruction of justice includes one offense (dissuading
a witness from reporting a crime) that does not require a
pending investigation or proceeding. Lower courts faced
with difficult questions about what offenses qualify as cat-
egorical matches for §1101(a)(43)(S) would do well to bear
in mind the limited nature of that holding. Many open
questions remain regarding whether offenses other than
dissuading a witness from reporting a crime are categorical
matches for §1101(a)(43)(S), what affirmative understand-
ing of §1101(a)(43)(S) should guide that categorical analy-
sis, and whether other offenses that also lack a connection
to a pending investigation or proceeding can qualify under
that analysis. 13 I do not take the majority to be addressing
any of these questions, and great care is warranted in an-
swering them in the future.
                        *    *     *
   By eliminating a central constraint on what qualifies as
“an offense relating to obstruction of justice” under
§1101(a)(43)(S), while providing zero affirmative guidance
as to what sorts of offenses are a match for that category,
the majority leaves lower courts and the Board of Immigra-
tion Appeals without direction and invites the Government
to advance far-ranging constructions of §1101(a)(43)(S) that
bear little resemblance to core obstruction of justice. I
——————
  13 On this list of open questions is whether state accessory-after-the-

fact convictions like petitioner Pugin’s are a categorical match for
§1101(a)(43)(S). The majority affirms the Fourth Circuit’s legal holding
that a pending investigation or proceeding is unnecessary for an offense
to qualify under §1101(a)(43)(S). The majority is conspicuously silent,
however, regarding the underlying offense itself and whether it is ob-
struction of justice under §1101(a)(43)(S). And for good reason, because
accessory offenses have their own distinct pedigree and purpose with his-
torical roots far afield from that of obstruction of justice. Cf. R Perkins,
Parties to Crime, 

, 581–582, 605–607 (1941).
                 Cite as: 

 (2023)          23

                  SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

would leave it to Congress, not the Judiciary, to decide
which additional crimes should be listed as aggravated fel-
onies under the INA. I respectfully dissent.