Blanche v. Lau: The Supreme Court Just Made International Travel Riskier for Green Card Holders With Any Criminal History
If you have a green card, a visa, or any other status that lets you live and work in the United States, and you also have any kind of criminal history, even something old, minor, or already resolved, a Supreme Court decision issued this summer changes how much you can safely assume about coming back after a trip abroad.
On June 23, 2026, the Supreme Court ruled in Blanche v. Lau, No. 25-429, that border officers do not need clear and convincing evidence of a disqualifying offense before they can treat a returning lawful permanent resident as someone who is newly seeking admission to the country, rather than someone who is already living here lawfully. In a 6-3 decision, the Court sided with the government and rejected the higher evidentiary standard that several federal courts had required. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson dissented, joined by Justices Sotomayor and Kagan.
This is not a small technical shift. It changes the odds at the border for a large group of people who assumed a valid green card meant a straightforward trip home.
What Happened in Blanche v. Lau
The case involved a lawful permanent resident, Muk Choi Lau, who had been charged with selling counterfeit goods. When he returned to the United States after travel, immigration officers treated him as someone seeking admission rather than as an already-admitted resident, based on that pending charge. The legal question was how much proof the government needs at that moment.
The Court held that nothing in the Immigration and Nationality Act requires clear and convincing evidence at the border itself. That standard, the majority found, came from Board of Immigration Appeals precedent, not from the statute. The practical result is that the government can rely on evidence developed later, including a conviction that comes after the person has already been paroled into removal proceedings, to justify treating that person as an applicant for admission in the first place.
In plain terms: a pending charge, or even less, may now be enough to put a returning green card holder into a legal category with far fewer protections than the one most people assume they occupy.
The "Arriving Alien" Problem, Explained
Here is the part of immigration law that makes this ruling so consequential. Under the Immigration and Nationality Act, a lawful permanent resident is generally not treated as someone "seeking admission" when they return from a trip abroad. Green card holders are not supposed to have to prove they deserve to come back every time they travel.
But federal law, at 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(13)(C), carves out six exceptions. A returning green card holder is treated as seeking admission, meaning they become subject to the same inadmissibility review as someone applying for a green card for the first time, if they:
Have abandoned or given up their permanent resident status
Have been outside the United States for more than 180 days
Engaged in illegal activity after leaving the country
Left while removal or extradition proceedings were pending against them
Committed an offense described in the criminal grounds of inadmissibility, unless they already received a waiver or cancellation of removal for it, or
Are trying to enter somewhere other than a designated port of entry, or without inspection
That fifth category is where most of the risk lives. It pulls in a wide range of criminal conduct, including a single crime involving moral turpitude and controlled substance offenses that would not even make someone deportable under the separate rules that apply to people who never leave the country. A conviction or admitted conduct that has sat quietly in someone's past for years, including something a state court sealed or expunged, can resurface the moment that person hands a green card to a border officer. Narrow exceptions exist, including for certain minor, one-time offenses, but they are genuinely easy to miscalculate, which is exactly why this determination should not be made without an attorney reviewing the specifics.
Before Blanche v. Lau, the government still had to meet a heightened evidentiary standard to make that determination stick. Now it does not, at least not at the moment of inspection. That is the shift.
It Is Not Only Green Card Holders Who Should Be Careful
Everything above concerns lawful permanent residents specifically, because the "seeking admission" framework in § 101(a)(13)(C) is written for people who already hold a green card. But nonimmigrant visa holders, including people on work, student, and exchange visas, face a related and separate risk that this ruling only underscores: a visa can be revoked at any time, including while its holder is outside the United States, and a consular officer or a border officer has broad discretion to question admissibility based on a criminal record, an arrest, or even conduct that never led to a conviction.
For both groups, the underlying lesson is the same. Immigration status is not simply a card or a stamp in a passport. It is a legal position that can be reassessed the moment someone presents themselves for reentry, and criminal history, however old or however resolved it may seem, is one of the things most likely to trigger that reassessment.
Why This Deserves Real Attention, Not a Guess
Every situation is different, and the right answer depends on the specific offense, when it happened, how it was resolved, and the person's immigration history. What we can say in general is this: an old arrest that never led to a conviction, a charge resolved through diversion or deferred adjudication, or a record that was expunged under state law does not necessarily mean it is invisible to immigration law. State expungement and immigration consequences are governed by different bodies of law, and they do not always agree with each other.
If you are a green card holder or visa holder with any criminal history at all, no matter how long ago or how minor it seemed at the time, that history should be reviewed by an immigration attorney before you book international travel, not after you are standing in a secondary inspection line trying to explain it. Under Blanche v. Lau, the government has more room to act first and sort out the proof later. That is exactly the scenario a good pre-travel review is meant to prevent.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does Blanche v. Lau mean a green card holder can be denied reentry just for an old, resolved criminal charge? It means the government does not need to meet as high a bar of proof at the border to treat a returning green card holder as an applicant for admission based on a past offense. Whether that particular offense actually makes someone inadmissible still depends on the specific facts, and there are exceptions. But the practical risk at the airport or land border has increased.
Does this ruling apply to pending charges, or only convictions? The case itself involved a pending charge. The Court's reasoning allows the government to rely on evidence developed after the person is paroled into proceedings, including a later conviction, which means pending and unresolved criminal matters carry more travel risk now than they did before this decision.
Does this only affect green card holders, or does it affect visa holders too? The specific legal doctrine in Blanche v. Lau concerns lawful permanent residents.
Nonimmigrant visa holders are not covered by the same statute, but they face their own, separate risk: a visa can be revoked at any time, including while someone is abroad, and admissibility can be reassessed at reentry. Anyone with any immigration status and any criminal history should treat international travel with caution right now.
Should someone with old criminal history cancel a planned trip? That is not a decision to make without first talking to an immigration attorney about the specific facts. It may be entirely fine to travel, or it may not be. The point of this article is that this determination has gotten harder to guess correctly on your own, not that everyone with any past record is at risk.
If you have any criminal history and international travel on the horizon, or if you already have a trip booked, we encourage you to talk to us before you go. This is exactly the kind of question worth answering in advance.
-Written by Attorney Laureen Anderson Stepanek, September 2026
