Cite as: 533 U. S. 678 (2001)
Opinion of the Court
due process protection for removable aliens to freedom from detention that is arbitrary or capricious. See post, at 717- 722 (dissenting opinion).
The Government also looks for support to cases holding that Congress has "plenary power" to create immigration law, and that the Judicial Branch must defer to Executive and Legislative Branch decisionmaking in that area. Brief for Respondents in No. 99-7791, at 17, 20 (citing Harisiades v. Shaughnessy, 342 U. S. 580, 588-589 (1952)). But that power is subject to important constitutional limitations. See INS v. Chadha, 462 U. S. 919, 941-942 (1983) (Congress must choose "a constitutionally permissible means of implementing" that power); The Chinese Exclusion Case, 130 U. S. 581, 604 (1889) (congressional authority limited "by the Constitution itself and considerations of public policy and justice which control, more or less, the conduct of all civilized nations"). In these cases, we focus upon those limitations. In doing so, we nowhere deny the right of Congress to remove aliens, to subject them to supervision with conditions when released from detention, or to incarcerate them where appropriate for violations of those conditions. See 8 U. S. C. § 1231(a)(3) (1994 ed., Supp. V) (granting authority to Attorney General to prescribe regulations governing supervision of aliens not removed within 90 days); § 1253 (imposing penalties for failure to comply with release conditions). The question before us is not one of " 'confer[ring] on those admitted the right to remain against the national will' " or " 'sufferance of aliens' " who should be removed. Post, at 703 (Scalia, J., dissenting) (emphasis deleted) (quoting Mezei, 345 U. S., at 222-223 (Jackson, J., dissenting)). Rather, the issue we address is whether aliens that the Government finds itself unable to remove are to be condemned to an indefinite term of imprisonment within the United States.
Nor do the cases before us require us to consider the political branches' authority to control entry into the United States. Hence we leave no "unprotected spot in the Na-
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