Cite as: 502 U. S. 129 (1991)
Opinion of the Court
the scope of proceedings governed by the formal adjudication requirements of the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), see 5 U. S. C. §§ 556, 557, and sets forth some of those requirements. As both parties agree that the United States was represented by counsel in Ardestani's deportation proceeding, the sole question presented in this case is whether that proceeding was an adversary adjudication "under section 554" within the meaning of the EAJA.
A
Section 554(a) states that the provisions of that section apply to "every case of adjudication required by statute to be determined on the record after opportunity for an agency hearing," with six statutory exceptions not relevant here. Subsections (b) through (e) of § 554 establish the procedures that must be followed in the agency adjudications described in subsection (a). Although immigration proceedings are required by statute to be determined on the record after a hearing, 8 U. S. C. § 1252(b), we previously have decided that they are not governed by the APA. Marcello v. Bonds, 349 U. S. 302 (1955).
In Marcello, we held that Congress intended the provisions of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 (INA), 66 Stat. 163, as amended, 8 U. S. C. § 1101 et seq., to supplant the APA in immigration proceedings. Two years before the enactment of the INA, we had concluded that immigration proceedings were subject to the APA. Wong Yang Sung v. McGrath, 339 U. S. 33 (1950). Congress legislatively overruled that decision almost immediately afterward in a rider to the Supplemental Appropriation Act, 1951. 64 Stat. 1044, 1048. In Marcello, we had to determine whether, in revising the immigration laws in 1952 and repealing the rider, Congress had reversed its previous position and reinstated the holding of the Wong Yang Sung case. We held that the INA "expressly supersedes" the hearing provisions of the APA in light of "the background of the 1952 immigration
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