## Facts

- The People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI), an Iranian opposition group, was designated and repeatedly redesignated by the Secretary of State as a foreign terrorist organization (FTO) under 8 U.S.C. § 1189.
- FTO designation carries domestic legal consequences, including blocking or seizure of U.S.-based assets and exposure of supporters to criminal liability for providing material support.
- Under § 1189, the Secretary’s decision is based on an administrative record that may include classified and unclassified material; the process does not provide an adversarial hearing.
- PMOI filed a petition for review in the D.C. Circuit challenging the Secretary’s most recent redesignation, the fifth in a series of related appellate decisions.
- PMOI argued that the redesignation process failed to provide constitutionally and statutorily required notice and an opportunity to respond, and that the redesignation was substantively unsupported under the applicable standard of review.

## Issues

1. Whether, in an FTO redesignation under 8 U.S.C. § 1189, due process requires the government to provide the organization notice of the unclassified material relied upon and a meaningful opportunity to respond before the decision.
2. Whether the Secretary’s redesignation decision should be set aside as arbitrary, capricious, or an abuse of discretion on the administrative record.
3. What remedy is appropriate when the redesignation process is procedurally deficient but the court does not reach (or does not resolve) the substantive merits of the designation.

## Decision

- The court rejected a broad attack on the FTO designation regime and left the statutory framework intact.
- The court held that PMOI was not afforded adequate process because it did not receive sufficiently specific notice of the unclassified evidence used to support the redesignation and therefore lacked a meaningful opportunity to rebut it.
- The court remanded to the Secretary to provide additional process and to reconsider the redesignation within a court-imposed deadline.
- The court did not vacate the FTO designation and did not decide that the Secretary’s substantive terrorism assessment was incorrect.

## Legal Principles

- An FTO designation may implicate due process because it has concrete domestic legal effects, including asset restrictions and criminal exposure for material support.
- Even in national security and foreign affairs matters, minimal due process requires notice of the unclassified grounds relied upon and an opportunity to submit a written rebuttal.
- The government may withhold classified information, but if it relies on unclassified material, it must disclose it with enough specificity to permit a meaningful response; conclusory summaries are insufficient.
- Judicial review under § 1189 is limited and highly deferential on substantive judgments, applying a standard akin to arbitrary-and-capricious review on the administrative record.
- When the defect is procedural rather than substantive, an appropriate remedy may be remand for corrective process and reconsideration rather than immediate vacatur of the designation.

## Conclusion

The D.C. Circuit required the Secretary of State to provide PMOI adequate notice of unclassified evidence and a real chance to respond before reaffirming an FTO redesignation, while maintaining substantial deference to the executive’s substantive national security judgments and remanding without ordering delisting.


People’s Mojahedin Org. of Iran v. U.S. Dep’t of State, 613 F.3d 220 (D.C. Cir. 2010)