8 U.S.C. § 1306
Section 1306 · Penalties
This is § 266 of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 (McCarran-Walter)
Amended 2 times on record
Applied in 39 court decisions — leading case Dowling v. Slotnik (1998)
Most recently applied in Gonzalez v. Sessions (June 2018)
How often courts cite this section
Court decisions citing this, by year.Markers show enactment, consequential amendments, and circuit splits over this section — watch for a citation surge after a change or a disagreement. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.
Any alien required to apply for registration and to be fingerprinted in the United States who willfully fails or refuses to make such application or to be fingerprinted, and any parent or legal guardian required to apply for the registration of any alien who willfully fails or refuses to file application for the registration of such alien shall be guilty of a misdemeanor and shall, upon conviction thereof, be fined not to exceed $1,000 or be imprisoned not more than six months, or both.
Any alien or any parent or legal guardian in the United States of any alien who fails to give written notice to the Attorney General, as required by section 1305 of this title, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor and shall, upon conviction thereof, be fined not to exceed $200 or be imprisoned not more than thirty days, or both. Irrespective of whether an alien is convicted and punished as herein provided, any alien who fails to give written notice to the Attorney General, as required by section 1305 of this title, shall be taken into custody and removed in the manner provided by part IV of this subchapter, unless such alien establishes to the satisfaction of the Attorney General that such failure was reasonably excusable or was not willful.
Any alien or any parent or legal guardian of any alien, who files an application for registration containing statements known by him to be false, or who procures or attempts to procure registration of himself or another person through fraud, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor and shall, upon conviction thereof, be fined not to exceed $1,000, or be imprisoned not more than six months, or both; and any alien so convicted shall, upon the warrant of the Attorney General, be taken into custody and be removed in the manner provided in part IV of this subchapter.
Any person who with unlawful intent photographs, prints, or in any other manner makes, or executes, any engraving, photograph, print, or impression in the likeness of any certificate of alien registration or an alien registration receipt card or any colorable imitation thereof, except when and as authorized under such rules and regulations as may be prescribed by the Attorney General, shall upon conviction be fined not to exceed $5,000 or be imprisoned not more than five years, or both.
Editorial notes U.S. Code · Office of the Law Revision Counsel
Amendments
1996—Subsecs. (b), (c). Pub. L. 104–208 substituted “removed” for “deported” and “part IV” for “Part V”.
Effective Date of 1996 Amendment
Amendment by Pub. L. 104–208 effective, with certain transitional provisions, on the first day of the first month beginning more than 180 days after Sept. 30, 1996, see section 309 of Pub. L. 104–208, set out as a note under section 1101 of this title.
Cross References
Definition of alien, Attorney General, and United States, see section 1101 of this title.