Asucena Velazquez Olais v. Todd Blanche

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit
• Decided: April 6, 2026
• Docket: 25-1244
• Status: Published
• Author: Easterbrook

Opinion

In the United States Court of Appeals For the Seventh Circuit ____________________

No. 25-1244 ASUCENA VELAZQUEZ-OLAIS, Petitioner, v.

TODD BLANCHE, Acting Attorney General of the United States, Respondent. ____________________

Petition for Review of an Administrative Decision Declining to Reopen a Removal Order ____________________

ARGUED FEBRUARY 19, 2026 — DECIDED APRIL 6, 2026 ____________________

Before EASTERBROOK, PRYOR, and KOLAR, Circuit Judges. EASTERBROOK, Circuit Judge. Asucena Velazquez-Olais en- tered the United States illegally (avoiding inspection at the border) some time before 2018. When a state conviction for possessing cocaine with intent to deliver, see 720 ILCS 570/401(d), brought her to the attention of federal officials, the Department of Homeland Security entered a “Final Adminis- trative Removal Order” (FARO) against her. See 8 U.S.C. §1228(b). Such an order is judicially reviewable, see Riley v. Bondi, 606 U.S. 259 (2025), but Velazquez-Olais did not file a 2 No. 25-1244 petition for review. She was removed to Mexico on August 10, 2018. She is back in the United States. Again we do not know when and how she entered, but she does not contend that the entry was authorized or lawful. She asked a state court to amend her conviction from “possession with intent to de- liver” to simple possession, contending that the quantity seized on her arrest (28.1 grams) is consistent with personal use. The state judiciary obliged. Counsel for Velazquez-Olais then asked an immigration official in Chicago to reopen and cancel the removal order. Af- ter an exchange of emails, a Deportation Officer in the Chi- cago Field Office of the Department of Homeland Security stated that the “Chicago Office” would not revisit the 2018 or- der. Velazquez-Olais now invokes 8 U.S.C. §1252(a), asking the court of appeals to review that email message. It is one thing to say, as the Justices did in Riley, that a final order of removal is reviewable even when entered through an expedited process. It is quite another to suppose that an email declining to do anything about an order executed years ago is the same as an order of removal. Riley carefully identified the characteristics that make something an order of removal. 606 U.S. at 267. The email that Velazquez-Olais received possesses none of these. With some exceptions, §1252(a)(1) authorizes a court of appeals to review a “final order of removal”, so we could have reviewed the 2018 order. But that order has been carried out. All questions about timing to one side (§1252(b)(1) allows only 30 days to seek judicial review), it is not possible to see an email from a field office as the agency’s final decision, let alone as a “final order of removal.” There is just nothing to review. The 2018 order has been executed. Once an order has been executed, it cannot be re- No. 25-1244 3 executed. Morales-Izquierdo v. Gonzales, 486 F.3d 484, 487 (9th Cir. 2007). An order of removal may be reinstated under 8 U.S.C. §1231(a)(5), and the act of reinstatement is reviewable under some circumstances. See Villa v. Barr, 924 F.3d 370, 372– 73 (7th Cir. 2019). But the 2018 order has not been reinstated. Instead the Department of Homeland Security restarted the removal process last July by issuing a Notice to Appear. A new decisional process is under way. Velazquez-Olais can ar- gue there that a conviction for simple possession of cocaine does not foreclose avenues of discretionary relief. If the ongoing process leads to a new order of removal, Velazquez-Olais will be free to seek judicial review. If she is criminally prosecuted for her reentry, that too would facilitate review, subject to the limitations in 8 U.S.C. §1326(d). See United States v. Palomar-Santiago, 593 U.S. 321 (2021); United States v. Manriquez-Alvarado, 953 F.3d 511 (7th Cir. 2020). But she is not now subject to an order of removal, so we lack ju- risdiction under §1252(a). The petition for review is dismissed.