It’s Only a Misdemeanor: Six Everyday Offenses and What Immigration Law Can Do With Them

Most ordinary offenses do not, on their own, end an immigration case. A first DUI is not a ground of deportation. A ticket for driving without a license is not a crime that immigration law lists anywhere. But a single shoplifting case can be enough to keep someone from getting a green card, and marijuana that is legal to buy in Montana can stop a citizenship application without any arrest at all. The offense people worry about is often not the one that does the damage.

This page walks through six offenses we are asked about all the time: a DUI, shoplifting or theft, marijuana, a partner or family member assault charge, a fake ID, and driving without a license. For each one, it explains what the offense can do to four kinds of people: a green card holder, a person on a visa or applying for one, a person without lawful status, and a permanent resident applying for citizenship. These are illustrations, not an analysis of anyone’s case. The legal framework behind them, including what counts as a conviction and the main categories of criminal grounds, is on our page on criminal convictions and immigration status.

Why can the same offense be harmless for one person and ruinous for another?

Because immigration law asks different questions than criminal law does, and the answers depend on three things the criminal court rarely thinks about.

First, the statute and the record, not the story. Immigration agencies and judges generally compare the law the person was convicted under, and the documents in the court file, against the federal definition of a category such as a “crime involving moral turpitude.” They do not re-try what actually happened. That is why two people who did the same thing can get opposite immigration results, and why the exact wording of a plea and the statute named in the judgment matter so much.

Second, the sentence on paper. Several rules turn on the sentence the judge ordered, and a suspended jail term counts as if it were imposed (INA § 101(a)(48)(B)). A deal that seems generous because no one goes to jail can still carry a one-year sentence for immigration purposes.

Third, where the person stands. The same conviction reads differently depending on who has it:

• A green card holder is mostly measured against the deportability grounds in INA § 237. But a resident who travels abroad can be treated as seeking admission on return, and then the stricter inadmissibility grounds apply.
• A person on a visa, or applying for a visa or a green card, is measured against the inadmissibility grounds in INA § 212, and also against the discretion of a consular officer or USCIS.
• A person without lawful status faces a different first problem: the arrest itself, which can lead to immigration custody before any court decides anything.
• A citizenship applicant must show good moral character for the statutory period, generally the five years before filing (three for spouses of U.S. citizens) and up to the oath. Conduct that never led to a conviction can count.

The diagram below shows those questions in the order a lawyer asks them. Then each section takes one offense through them.

Can a DUI get me deported?

Not by itself, under the law as it stands in October 2026. No ground of deportation or inadmissibility in the Immigration and Nationality Act names driving under the influence. A simple DUI is not a crime involving moral turpitude, and the Board of Immigration Appeals has held that several of them do not add up to one (Matter of Torres-Varela, 23 I&N Dec. 78 (BIA 2001)). The Supreme Court has held that a DUI requiring no intent is not a “crime of violence,” so it is not an aggravated felony on that basis (Leocal v. Ashcroft, 543 U.S. 1 (2004)). A bill that would make any DUI a ground of removal passed the House on June 26, 2025, but as of October 2026 it has not passed the Senate (H.R. 875).

That is the good news, and it is where most people stop reading. The harder part is everything a DUI does without being a ground of removal:

• Aggravated versions can cross the line. The Board has held that a DUI committed while the driver knew his license was suspended is a crime involving moral turpitude (Matter of Lopez-Meza, 22 I&N Dec. 1188 (BIA 1999)). The Ninth Circuit, which covers Montana, has since required a closer look at exactly which version of the offense the person was convicted of. Montana’s own “aggravated DUI” includes driving on a license suspended for an earlier DUI, and whether that version fits the Board’s rule depends on the record. A DUI involving drugs can also raise the controlled-substance questions discussed below.
• Visas. The State Department may revoke a visa after a DUI arrest within the previous five years, without waiting for a conviction (9 FAM 403.11-5(B)(c)). At the next visa application, consular officers send applicants with one alcohol-related arrest or conviction in the last five years, or two in the last ten, to the panel physician (9 FAM 302.2-7(B)(3)). The question there is medical: whether the person has a disorder with harmful behavior that may recur. For seasonal workers this is the problem that actually costs a season; our page on DUI charges and the H-2A visa walks through it.
• Citizenship. Two or more DUI convictions during the statutory period create a presumption that the applicant lacks good moral character (Matter of Castillo-Perez, 27 I&N Dec. 664 (A.G. 2019)). The presumption can be rebutted, but only with substantial evidence that the convictions were an aberration. USCIS applies the same rule in its Policy Manual, Volume 12, Part F, Chapter 5, which also treats repeated DUIs as possible evidence of being a “habitual drunkard.”
• Anything a judge or officer decides by discretion. In 2026 the Board called a 2007 DWAI that caused an accident “a significant adverse factor” when it reversed a grant of cancellation of removal to a Canadian-born permanent resident of 30 years who also had theft, burglary, child-endangerment and harassment convictions (Matter of Mills, 29 I&N Dec. 668 (BIA 2026)), and held that four DUI convictions, some with aggravating facts, justified denying asylum as a matter of discretion to a man who had already been granted withholding of removal (Matter of P-A-C-, 29 I&N Dec. 708 (BIA 2026)).
• Bond. Where a bond hearing is available (as of October 2026, the Ninth Circuit, which covers Montana, requires one for most people arrested inside the country), a DUI record weighs heavily on whether the person is a danger to the community. In Matter of Morales Cuxun, 30 I&N Dec. 121 (BIA 2026), decided August 31, 2026, the Board held a man without bond because of one DWI conviction, earlier arrests for impaired driving and for operating a boat under the influence, and a domestic assault arrest less than two months before the hearing, which he partly admitted, even though he had family ties and character letters.

One Montana fact changes how these cases are handled. Montana law does not allow a judge to defer imposition of sentence on a DUI (MCA 61-8-1011(4)), so a DUI that ends in a guilty plea ends in a conviction. Whether the charge can be resolved as something else is a question for the criminal defense lawyer, and the immigration question has to be part of that conversation before the plea.

Is shoplifting a crime involving moral turpitude?

Usually, yes. Under the Board’s current test, a theft offense is a crime involving moral turpitude when it involves taking property with the intent to deprive the owner of it permanently, or under circumstances where the owner’s property rights are substantially eroded (Matter of Diaz-Lizarraga, 26 I&N Dec. 847 (BIA 2016)). Montana’s theft statute generally fits that description. For convictions before November 16, 2016, the Ninth Circuit may require the older, narrower test, which is one reason the date of an old case matters.

What a theft conviction does next depends on the numbers:

• Applying for a visa or a green card. One crime involving moral turpitude makes a person inadmissible, unless the “petty offense” exception applies: it must be the person’s only such crime, the maximum possible sentence must be one year or less, and the sentence imposed must be six months or less, counting any suspended time (INA § 212(a)(2)(A)(ii)(II)). In Montana, a first or second theft of property worth $1,500 or less carries a maximum of six months (MCA 45-6-301(7)(a)), so a first misdemeanor shoplifting conviction will often qualify. A second one will not.
• A green card holder. One conviction for a crime involving moral turpitude makes a resident deportable only if it was committed within five years after admission and the offense could carry a sentence of a year or more (INA § 237(a)(2)(A)(i)). A Montana misdemeanor theft, with its six-month maximum, does not meet the second condition. But two such convictions at any time after admission, not arising from a single scheme, make a resident deportable regardless of the sentence. The second shoplifting case is the dangerous one.
• A felony-level theft. Theft of more than $1,500 is a Montana felony with a maximum of ten years. If the sentence is a year or more, even fully suspended, the conviction is an “aggravated felony” (INA § 101(a)(43)(G)), which is close to the worst result immigration law has. The difference between a 364-day sentence and a one-year sentence can decide a resident’s future.
• A person without lawful status. Since January 29, 2025, the Laken Riley Act has required immigration authorities to detain, without a bond hearing, a person who entered without inspection or is inadmissible for certain fraud or document grounds and who “is charged with, is arrested for, is convicted of, admits having committed, or admits committing acts which constitute the essential elements of” theft, shoplifting, or several other offenses (INA § 236(c)(1)(E)). No conviction is required. Our page on detention and bond hearings explains how that mandate fits with the rest of detention law.
• A citizenship applicant. A crime involving moral turpitude committed in the statutory period generally bars good moral character for that period, with the same petty-offense exception (INA § 101(f)(3); 8 CFR 316.10(b)(2)(i)), and an admitted theft that was never charged can count too. Even a theft that fits the exception has to be disclosed, and officers can weigh it.

Montana made marijuana legal. Why does immigration law still care?

Because immigration law follows federal drug law, not Montana’s. Montana voters legalized adult-use marijuana in November 2020, and adults 21 and over may now possess up to an ounce (MCA 16-12-106). As of October 2026, adult-use marijuana remains a Schedule I controlled substance under federal law. A federal order effective April 28, 2026 moved only marijuana in FDA-approved products and state-licensed medical marijuana to Schedule III (91 Fed. Reg. 22714), and a Schedule III drug is still a controlled substance for immigration purposes. As of October 2026, the broader rescheduling proceeding has not produced a final rule.

That gap creates four separate risks:

• A conviction. A conviction for violating any drug law, state, federal, or foreign, makes a person inadmissible, and for most people deportable too. The one statutory soft spot is a single offense of possessing 30 grams or less of marijuana for one’s own use: it is not a ground of deportation, and as a ground of inadmissibility it may be waivable under the § 212(h) criminal waiver for people who qualify, usually through a citizen or resident family member or because fifteen years have passed.
• An admission, with no arrest at all. The inadmissibility ground also covers a person who “admits committing acts which constitute the essential elements of” a drug offense. On September 22, 2026, the Board held that a man who admitted under oath at his green card interview that he had used and possessed cocaine was inadmissible on that admission alone, and it overruled two decisions from the 1940s and 1950s that had required the officer to explain the legal definition of the offense first (Matter of Mendez Maldonado, 30 I&N Dec. 62 (BIA 2026)). The admission must still be voluntary. The decision was about cocaine, but its reasoning is not limited to one drug, and our reading is that an admission of marijuana use or possession, even legal under Montana law, can be treated the same way. The green card form asks whether the applicant has ever violated any controlled substance law, and the question does not exclude conduct that a state allows.
• Work in the industry. USCIS’s Policy Manual says that possessing marijuana for recreational or medical use, or working in the marijuana industry, may be conduct that violates federal law and can bar good moral character for citizenship, “even where such activity is not a criminal offense under state law” (12 USCIS-PM F.5(C)(2)). A separate inadmissibility ground covers anyone the government knows or has “reason to believe” is or has been a drug trafficker, or has knowingly helped with trafficking, and the N-400 asks whether the applicant has ever cultivated, distributed, dispensed or sold a controlled substance. A dispensary job is the kind of fact that needs advice before any form is filed.
• Use itself. Being a drug abuser or addict is a separate ground of inadmissibility and of deportability, and the immigration medical exam asks about drug use. The Ninth Circuit has held that an admission of marijuana use made to the examining doctor can be used against the applicant (Pazcoguin v. Radcliffe, 292 F.3d 1209 (9th Cir. 2002)).

The answer is never to give a false answer. A false statement to the government is its own problem, often worse than the marijuana, as our page on what happens when “no” is the wrong answer on immigration forms explains. The answer is to get advice before the interview or medical exam, while there is still time to plan.

Will a partner or family member assault charge cost me my green card?

It can, but not automatically, and the details of the conviction decide it. Immigration law makes a person deportable for a “crime of domestic violence,” which it defines as a crime of violence, in the federal sense, committed against a spouse, former spouse, co-parent, or someone else protected by domestic-violence laws (INA § 237(a)(2)(E)(i)). Montana’s partner or family member assault statute has three versions: causing bodily injury, negligently causing bodily injury with a weapon, and causing “reasonable apprehension of bodily injury” (MCA 45-5-206(1)). The Ninth Circuit has twice held that even the bodily-injury version does not require physical force, because Montana’s definition of bodily injury includes mental impairment (United States v. DeFrance, 124 F.4th 814 (9th Cir. 2024), a federal firearms case; United States v. Castro, 71 F.4th 735 (9th Cir. 2023), a sentencing case). As of October 2026, no published immigration decision has applied that reasoning to the deportation ground, but it gives a resident a serious argument. That is why the subsection the person pleaded to, and what the court record says, can matter a great deal.

Four other points readers usually do not expect:

• Domestic violence is a deportation ground, not an inadmissibility ground. A conviction does not by itself bar a green card the way a drug conviction does, though it may still be a crime involving moral turpitude, depending on the statute, and it always weighs in any decision that involves discretion.
• A protection order needs no conviction. A person whom a court finds has violated the part of a protection order that guards against violence, threats, repeated harassment or bodily injury is deportable on that finding (INA § 237(a)(2)(E)(ii)).
• Arrests count in custody. In Morales Cuxun, a domestic assault arrest that had not yet gone to trial helped keep the respondent detained without bond.
• The plea is where it is won. Our page on criminal convictions and immigration status explains why a true deferred prosecution, or a plea to a different offense, can leave a resident safe where a suspended sentence for domestic violence would not.

Is a fake ID a big deal for immigration?

The fake ID itself is usually the smaller problem. In Montana, displaying a fictitious or altered license or ID card is a misdemeanor (MCA 61-5-302). What turns a fake document into an immigration catastrophe is what it was used for.

• Claiming to be a U.S. citizen. A person who falsely claims U.S. citizenship for any purpose or benefit under federal or state law, including to get a job, is permanently inadmissible if the claim was made on or after September 30, 1996 (INA § 212(a)(6)(C)(ii)). There is no waiver for a green card and no time limit; the only relief is a discretionary waiver for some temporary visas. The most common way it happens is checking the “citizen of the United States” box on an employment form, or registering to vote. The Board has held that the inadmissibility ground requires that the claim was made to get something for which citizenship actually mattered (Matter of Richmond, 26 I&N Dec. 779 (BIA 2016)), but the matching deportation ground requires no proof of intent at all (Matter of Zhang, 27 I&N Dec. 569 (BIA 2019)). The only statutory exception is narrow: each parent was a U.S. citizen, the person lived permanently in the United States before age 16, and the person reasonably believed he or she was a citizen.
• Other people’s documents. Using someone else’s papers to work can lead to separate document-fraud findings, and it tends to come up together with a false claim.
• The underage bar ID. A young person’s fake ID used to buy alcohol, with no citizenship claim and no employment use, is a different and much smaller matter, but it still has to be disclosed when a form asks about arrests or citations.

If any of this is in your history, do not repeat the claim and do not answer the question on a new form until you have had advice.

I was stopped for driving without a license. Does that hurt my immigration case?

As an offense, almost never. In Montana, driving without a valid license is punishable by a fine of up to $500 and no jail (MCA 61-5-102). No ground of inadmissibility or deportability lists it, and it is not a crime involving moral turpitude. We include it because it is the offense people most often fear, and the honest answer is reassuring about the offense itself.

The danger is the contact, not the charge:

• For a person without status, a traffic stop is one of the most common ways into immigration custody, through fingerprints at booking and an immigration detainer. A license charge alone does not trigger the Laken Riley Act’s mandatory detention. For a person who entered without inspection, a theft, shoplifting, burglary or assault-of-an-officer charge in the same stop would. Our guide to what to do when a family member is picked up by ICE in Montana covers the first hours.
• In bond and discretion, unlicensed driving has started to carry weight. On October 6, 2026, the Board denied bond to a long-haul truck driver who had no valid commercial license and was arrested in Wyoming after failing to stop at a highway truck port of entry on I-80, finding that he had not shown he was not a danger (Matter of M-S-V-, 30 I&N Dec. 130 (BIA 2026)). In P-A-C-, the Board also noted the applicant’s choice to keep driving without a valid license or on a suspended one.
• On every later form, the stop is part of the record. The N-400 asks whether the applicant has ever been “arrested, cited, detained or confined” by law enforcement, and a citation has to be listed even if it was paid by mail. Our guide to the criminal record you didn’t know you had explains which records hold these stops and how to pull them before you file.

What should I do if one of these is on my record, or a charge is pending now?

It depends on where you are in the process, and the earlier the better:

• A charge is pending. Talk to an immigration attorney before you plead to anything, and ask your criminal defense lawyer to do the same. The Supreme Court has held that defense lawyers must advise non-citizen clients about the immigration consequences of a plea; our page on Padilla and why to talk to an immigration attorney before you plead explains what that requires. Defense lawyers looking for a practitioner’s summary of the categories can use the Immigrant Defense Project’s immigration consequences of crimes checklist, updated in September 2026.
• A green card holder with a pending charge wants to travel. Don’t, until you have had advice. The Supreme Court held in 2026 that a returning resident with a pending charge can be treated as seeking admission; see what the Blanche v. Lau decision means for travel.
• The case is old and you are about to file something. Pull your records first, read what the court file actually says, and have the disposition reviewed against the form questions. Naturalization deserves special care, because the N-400 reopens the whole file; see why naturalization is an audit of everything that came before it.
• The conviction makes you inadmissible. Some grounds can be waived and some cannot. Our page on whether you need a § 212(h) waiver explains which crimes it reaches.

We handle these questions as part of an immigration practice that has dealt with criminal records since 1996: which pleas to avoid, which charges carry no immigration consequence, and whether an existing conviction creates a problem for the application in front of you. For complex categorical analysis of serious felony charges, we work with attorneys who specialize in that intersection, and we will tell you when your case needs one.

What is the most common mistake?

Pleading guilty quickly to make a small case go away. A plea entered at a first appearance to avoid another trip to court can become the conviction an immigration officer reads ten years later. Before the plea, a criminal defense lawyer and an immigration lawyer working together often have real options: a different charge, a different sentence, or a pretrial deferred prosecution that requires no guilty plea. After the plea, the options are narrower, slower and more expensive. If you are not a U.S. citizen and you have been charged with anything, contact us before the case is resolved, not after.