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UNITED STATES v. TEXAS

Gorsuch, J., concurring in judgment

soon as the Court announces this general rule, it adds a caveat, stressing that “[t]his case concerns only arrest and prosecution policies.” Ante, at 12, n. 5. It’s a curious qualification. Article II does not have an Arrest and Prosecution Clause. It endows the President with the “executive Power,” §1, cl. 1, and charges him with “tak[ing] Care” that federal laws are “faithfully executed,” §3. These provisions give the President a measure of discretion over the enforcement of all federal laws, not just those that can lead to arrest and prosecution. So if the Court means what it says about Article II, can it mean what it says about the narrowness of its holding? There’s another curious qualification in the Court’s opinion too. “[T]he standing calculus might change,” we are told, “if the Executive Branch wholly abandoned its statutory responsibilities to make arrests or bring prosecutions.” Ante, at 11. But the Court declines to say more than that because “the States have not advanced” such an argument. Ibid. Is that true, though? The States have pleaded a claim under the Take Care Clause. App. 106. Is that not an abdication argument? Did they fail to plead it properly? Or is the Court simply ignoring it?

II

As I see it, the jurisdictional problem the States face in this case isn’t the lack of a “judicially cognizable” interest or injury. Ante, at 5 (internal quotation marks omitted). The States proved that the Guidelines increase the number of aliens with criminal convictions and final orders of removal released into the States. They also proved that, as a result, they spend more money on everything from law enforcement to healthcare. The problem the States face concerns something else altogether—a lack of redressability.

To establish redressability, a plaintiff must show from the outset of its suit that its injuries are capable of being remedied “ ‘by a favorable decision.’ ” Lujan, 504 U. S., at 561; see also id., at 570, n. 5 (plurality opinion). Ordinarily,