Justice Neil Gorsuch, President Trump's
first Supreme Court appointment, cast the deciding vote in a decision
released Tuesday that sided with an immigrant fighting his deportation.
Gorsuch
sided with court's four liberal justices in favor of the immigrant,
James Garcia Dimaya, who the government sought to deport after his
second first-degree burglary conviction in California.
The
Justice Department argued his first-degree burglary conviction
constituted a crime of violence, which is an aggravated felony that
results in deportation under the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA).
However, the court said Tuesday that the law’s definition of a crime of violence is too vague.
In
delivering the opinion of the court Justice Elena Kagan relied on a
2015 ruling in which the court said a similar clause in the Armed Career
Criminal Act (ACCA) that defined a “violent felony” was
unconstitutionally void for vagueness.