Immigration Consequences of a California Criminal Conviction: What the State Calls It vs. What Federal Law Counts

Someone has probably already told you what your California case means for your immigration status. A relative, a lawyer in a hallway, a notario, a website you found at two in the morning. The answers don't agree, and there's a reason for that.

California and federal immigration law use the same words to mean different things. Your court calls the outcome a dismissal, an expungement, a misdemeanor, a diversion, a reduction. Federal law does not take those labels at face value.

It applies its own definitions to the statute charged or convicted of and to whatever sentence ends up on the record. The translation is where the damage happens.

This page is that translation, label by label. It states the law as of August 26, 2026.

Before anything else: are you being kept out, or pushed out?

Two separate federal statutes are in play, and which one reaches you has nothing to do with what you were charged with. It depends on where you are standing.

If you have already been admitted to the United States, the criminal grounds that apply are the deportability grounds at 8 U.S.C. § 1227 (opens in a new window). Those are the rules for pushing someone out.

If you are seeking admission, adjustment of status, or another immigration benefit, the grounds that apply are the inadmissibility grounds at 8 U.S.C. § 1182 (opens in a new window). Those are the rules for keeping someone out. A lawful permanent resident coming home from a trip abroad can be pulled into this second category.

The two statutes carry different grounds, different exceptions, and different time windows. An answer that is right for someone already admitted can be wrong for the same conviction in a green card application. When you ask a lawyer what a conviction does to you, the first thing they should ask back is which position you're in.

Everything below is the second problem: not which statute reaches you, but whether what happened in your California courtroom counts at all under it.

What federal law counts as a conviction, and what it doesn't

Federal immigration law does not borrow California's definition of a conviction. It wrote its own, at 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(48)(A) (opens in a new window), and that definition is the hinge most of this turns on.

There is a conviction if a court entered a formal judgment of guilt. There is also a conviction where the judge withheld adjudication of guilt but two things both happened: a judge or jury found you guilty, or you pleaded guilty or nolo contendere, meaning no contest, or you admitted enough facts to warrant a finding of guilt; and the judge ordered some punishment, penalty, or restraint on liberty. Both prongs are required. What a California judge later calls the outcome does not control.

The statute goes further on sentences. A term of imprisonment includes the confinement the court ordered "regardless of any suspension of the imposition or execution of that imprisonment or sentence in whole or in part." A suspended sentence counts at its full length even if you never spent a night in jail.

Now the other direction, which almost no page tells you. A disposition entered with no plea and no finding of guilt cannot satisfy the first prong at all. California Penal Code section 1000 (opens in a new window) has been pre-plea pretrial diversion since January 1, 2018, when AB 208 took effect: the prosecutor reviews eligibility and files a declaration, and the court can set the diversion hearing at arraignment. The current text requires no guilty plea, no nolo plea, and no admission of facts.

Do not turn that into a general rule. "Diversion counts" and "diversion doesn't count" are both wrong as blanket statements, because whether a program requires a plea depends on that specific statute. Ask which program, then ask whether you entered a plea.

The Board of Immigration Appeals has also held that a state adjudication corresponding to a juvenile delinquency determination under the Federal Juvenile Delinquency Act is not a conviction under section 101(a)(48)(A). That is the general federal rule, not a statement about any particular California juvenile case, and a minor prosecuted as an adult produces an adult conviction.

California built one targeted fix for old drug-diversion pleas. In enacting Penal Code section 1203.43, the Legislature declared that the promise in section 1000.4 "constitutes misinformation about the actual consequences of making a plea in the case of some defendants, including all noncitizen defendants," and that the prior plea "is invalid." If you were granted deferred entry of judgment on or after January 1, 1997, performed satisfactorily, and had the charges dismissed, you may ask to withdraw the plea and have the case dismissed.

Your case was dismissed in California. Why federal law may still see a conviction

Penal Code section 1203.4 (opens in a new window) says a person granted relief "shall thereafter be released from all penalties and disabilities resulting from the offense." People read that sentence and stop.

Read the rest of the same subdivision. In any later prosecution for another offense, the prior conviction "may be pleaded and proved and shall have the same effect as if probation had not been granted or the accusation or information dismissed." The order also does not relieve you of the duty to disclose the conviction in answer to a direct question on an application for public office, for state or local licensure, or for contracting with the California State Lottery Commission.

California changed what the conviction does, not whether it exists. A Penal Code 1203.4 dismissal is covered separately in what a California dismissal actually does.

The federal agency says the same in guidance its own officers apply. The USCIS Policy Manual chapter on good moral character in naturalization cases states that "a record of conviction that has been expunged does not remove the underlying conviction," and tells officers they may demand the record anyway, with obtaining it left to the applicant.

Vacaturs are treated differently, and the reason for the vacatur is what separates them. USCIS instructs that a judgment vacated for cause, meaning constitutional defects, statutory defects, or pre-conviction errors affecting guilt, is not a conviction for immigration purposes, while one dismissed for any other reason, such as completing a rehabilitative period or avoiding immigration consequences, remains one. The Board held the same in Matter of Pickering: a conviction vacated solely for rehabilitation or immigration hardship "is not eliminated for immigration purposes." That is the framework in the Ninth Circuit, which includes California.

California's automatic relief hits the same wall. Under Penal Code section 1203.425, beginning October 1, 2024 and subject to appropriation, the Department of Justice reviews state criminal justice databases monthly and grants relief, including dismissal, with no petition from anyone. That releases a person from all penalties and disabilities under California law. It does not erase the conviction under the federal definition.

If your case is old and involved first-time simple possession, one date matters. Under the Ninth Circuit's rule in Lujan-Armendariz v. INS, a first-offense simple possession conviction that was expunged under a state rehabilitative statute was not a conviction for immigration purposes in that circuit, because equal protection was held to require treating it like a federal conviction expunged under the Federal First Offender Act. The en banc court overruled that holding in Nunez-Reyes v. Holder and applied the change prospectively only: "For those aliens convicted before the publication date of this decision, Lujan-Armendariz applies. For those aliens convicted after the publication date of this decision, Lujan-Armendariz is overruled." The publication date was July 14, 2011. The window is narrow — first offense, simple possession, state rehabilitative relief, conviction before that date — and whether a particular case sits inside it is a question for an immigration lawyer, not something to read off a page.

Outside that window the certain half is flat: a section 1203.4 dismissal does not make the conviction disappear for federal purposes. What weight it carries in a discretionary decision is a question for an immigration lawyer.

One day of jail can change the answer

Several federal tests turn on whether a number is one year or something less. California moved that line by a single day.

Penal Code section 18.5 (opens in a new window) makes every California offense punishable by up to one year in county jail punishable by no more than 364 days, and applies "retroactively, whether or not the case was final as of January 1, 2015." Subdivision (b) lets someone sentenced to a one-year jail term before that date ask the sentencing court to modify it to 364 days.

Here is the part that surprises people. That retroactivity does not carry over to federal immigration law. The Ninth Circuit held the amendment "cannot be applied retroactively for purposes of § 1227(a)(2)(A)(i)," so for California misdemeanor convictions entered before January 1, 2015, federal authorities still treat the maximum possible sentence as one year. Both statements are true at once.

Two of those rows are where published summaries go wrong most often. The single crime involving moral turpitude ground asks what the statute allows, not what the judge gave you. Its five-year clock runs from the date of admission, not from when you first entered the country and not from how long you have lived here. If you entered without inspection you have no date of admission at all, which changes the analysis rather than starting a clock.

Falling outside that window is not a clean bill of health. A separate inadmissibility ground reaches a moral turpitude crime with no window and no sentence threshold, subject only to the petty offense exception, and another deportability ground reaches two or more such crimes not arising out of a single scheme, at any time after admission.

California also lets certain offenses be treated as misdemeanors: section 17(b) makes a wobbler "a misdemeanor for all purposes" in five listed circumstances, set out in the five moments a California wobbler can change. That phrase states California law. Whether federal authorities honor a post-judgment reduction is a separate question for an immigration lawyer.

Every number in that table is something a lawyer can negotiate for before a plea is entered.

"Crime involving moral turpitude" is not defined anywhere in federal law

You will meet the phrase "crime involving moral turpitude" on this page, on our criminal practice pages, and in almost everything written about convictions and immigration status. No statute defines it. Congress used it to do real work — it is the trigger in the deportability ground at 8 U.S.C. § 1227(a)(2)(A) (opens in a new window), and again in the inadmissibility ground at 8 U.S.C. § 1182(a)(2)(A) — and then wrote the Act's definitions section (opens in a new window) without using the words once, even though it stopped there to define "conviction." USCIS tells its own officers the same thing in plain terms: the phrase "has no statutory definition."

What content the phrase has comes from roughly a century of agency and court decisions instead. In that case law it is described in old, moralistic language — the Board of Immigration Appeals says the term generally refers to conduct that is "inherently base, vile, or depraved, and contrary to the accepted rules of morality and the duties owed between persons or to society in general," (opens in a new window) and it looks for two things together: reprehensible conduct plus a culpable mental state. Read that and your instinct will be to run the test on yourself — was what I did vile, or wasn't it. Do not. That moral language is not applied to what you did.

What an adjudicator actually reads is the criminal statute you were convicted under: the specific code section and subdivision, and what that section requires a prosecutor to prove in every case brought under it. Those required components are the "elements," and the whole comparison runs between those elements and the standards the decisions have built up. The State Department states the rule flatly in the manual it writes for its own visa officers — moral turpitude "is determined by the nature of the statutory offense for which the applicant was convicted, particularly in the wording of the specific law that the applicant was convicted under, and not by the acts underlying the conviction," and evidence about the underlying act, "including the testimony of the applicant, is not relevant" (9 FAM 302.3-2(B)(2)(a) (opens in a new window)). Lawyers call this the categorical approach.

That produces a result most people find backwards in both directions. Because the comparison is to the statute rather than to the person, the analysis can turn on the least serious conduct the section realistically reaches rather than the worst — so a broadly written section may fail the match for everyone convicted under it, and a narrowly written one may match even where the facts were sympathetic. Some code sections describe more than one distinct crime; where that is so, an adjudicator may open a limited court record for the single purpose of identifying which one the conviction rested on, not to re-examine what happened. This is why the section you plead to matters more than what the charge is called, and why two people who were both convicted "of the same thing" in California can get different answers.

None of this is settled the way a statute would be. The framework itself changed twice between 2008 and 2016: the Attorney General authorized adjudicators to look beyond the record of conviction in 2008, vacated that decision in 2015, and the Board returned to an elements-based framework in 2016 — so summaries written in between are still circulating and still wrong. Federal courts also do not currently agree on how much weight to give the immigration agency's reading of the phrase, and that question is unsettled in the federal appeals court covering California; they disagree as well about how to measure the least conduct a statute reaches. Even the government's own published category lists carry a disclaimer that they "are not meant to be exhaustive," with instructions telling officers to send hard questions to agency lawyers rather than answer from the list.

So treat any page that tells you whether a particular California offense is or is not a crime involving moral turpitude as unreliable, and treat any list as a starting point for a lawyer rather than an answer for you. The Supreme Court has said as much about criminal practice generally: "Immigration law can be complex, and it is a legal specialty of its own." (opens in a new window) We defend criminal cases. We do not practice immigration law, and whether a conviction carries immigration consequences is a question for an immigration attorney, who should review the specific statute and the specific proposed disposition before a plea is entered.

Why the statute you plead to matters more than what the charge is called

Courts deciding whether a state conviction matches a federal immigration category use the categorical approach. It looks to "what the state conviction necessarily involved and not the facts underlying the case," and presumes the conviction rested on no more than the least of the acts the statute criminalizes.

That is why the code section and subdivision matter more than the name on the charging document. The elements govern, and what actually happened generally does not enter the analysis. Only where a statute is divisible into alternative elements may a court consult a limited record of conviction to see which alternative you were convicted under.

Ambiguity in that record is not neutral. In Pereida v. Wilkinson, the Supreme Court held that certain nonpermanent residents seeking cancellation of removal carry the burden of showing they were not convicted of a disqualifying offense, and have not carried it where the statute lists multiple offenses, some disqualifying, and the record is ambiguous. A messy record can beat you without anyone proving anything.

"Aggravated felony" is a federal term of art, not a description of how serious something sounds. The definition runs through 21 subparagraphs, (A) through (U), reaches state offenses as well as federal ones, and applies "regardless of whether the conviction was entered before, on, or after September 30, 1996."

The controlled substance deportability ground at 8 U.S.C. § 1227(a)(2)(B)(i), which reaches a conviction at any time after admission, is written broadly and has one statutory exception: a single offense involving possession for your own use of 30 grams or less of marijuana. The inadmissibility ground at § 1182(a)(2)(A)(i)(II) has no equivalent exception — an applicant for admission or adjustment of status may at most seek a discretionary waiver under § 1182(h) for a single offense of simple possession of 30 grams or less of marijuana, which is not automatic. A full and unconditional pardon by the President or a Governor waives the moral turpitude, multiple-offense, aggravated felony, and high-speed-flight deportability grounds, but does not reach the controlled substance, firearms, or domestic violence, stalking and child abuse grounds.

A conviction can also cost you the relief you would otherwise use to fight removal. Cancellation of removal (opens in a new window) for a lawful permanent resident requires 5 years as an LPR, 7 years of continuous residence after admission, and no aggravated felony conviction. The stop-time rule cuts that accrual off at the earlier of a notice to appear or the date you committed an offense referred to in section 1182(a)(2). Commission, not conviction.

California gives you leverage over your own lawyer

In Padilla v. Kentucky, the Supreme Court held that "counsel must inform her client whether his plea carries a risk of deportation," and drew a two-tier duty. Where the law is not succinct and straightforward, counsel need only advise that the charges may carry a risk of adverse immigration consequences. Where the deportation consequence is truly clear, the duty to give correct advice is equally clear. The Court called deportation "an integral part" of the penalty, and "sometimes the most important part."

Padilla does not help everyone. The Court later held in Chaidez v. United States that "Padilla does not have retroactive effect," putting that claim out of reach for anyone whose conviction became final before Padilla was decided on March 31, 2010. That is one reason California wrote its own version: Penal Code section 1016.2 (opens in a new window) declares the Legislature's intent to codify Padilla and related California case law, naming People v. Soriano, People v. Barocio, and People v. Bautista.

Then section 1016.3 (opens in a new window) goes further than Padilla does. Subdivision (a) says defense counsel "shall provide accurate and affirmative advice about the immigration consequences of a proposed disposition" and, with your informed consent, defend against them. Not may. Shall. Subdivision (b) puts a duty on the other side too: the prosecution "shall consider the avoidance of adverse immigration consequences in the plea negotiation process as one factor in an effort to reach a just resolution." If your case is open, both are things you can ask for in writing.

The advisement itself lives in section 1016.5 (opens in a new window). Before accepting a guilty or nolo contendere plea to any offense punishable as a crime under state law, other than an infraction, the court must administer verbatim on the record the advisement that if you are not a citizen, conviction may have the consequences of deportation, exclusion from admission, or denial of naturalization. The verbatim requirement took effect January 1, 2026 under SB 281; the infraction exception was already there, and the section reaches pleas only, not trial convictions.

Whether to take a plea at all is a separate decision, covered in a plea agreement against going to trial.

Subdivision (b) supplies the remedy and places the burden sensibly. Where the court failed to give the advisement after January 1, 1978 and you show the conviction may carry deportation, exclusion, or denial-of-naturalization consequences, the court "shall vacate the judgment" and let you withdraw the plea. And "absent a record that the court provided the advisement," you are "presumed not to have received" it.

One protection is easy to miss. California law states the Legislature's intent that at the time of the plea no defendant shall be required to disclose their legal status to the court. You are not obliged to announce your status in a criminal courtroom.

If you already pleaded guilty and no one explained this

There is a California statute for exactly that. Penal Code section 1473.7 (opens in a new window) lets a person no longer in criminal custody move to vacate a conviction or sentence that is "legally invalid due to prejudicial error damaging the moving party's ability to meaningfully understand, defend against, or knowingly accept" its immigration consequences. A finding of legal invalidity "may, but need not, include a finding of ineffective assistance of counsel." You do not have to prove your old lawyer was incompetent.

The standard is preponderance of the evidence, and the court "shall grant" the motion if you meet it. A subdivision (a)(1) motion is timely once you are out of criminal custody, but may be deemed untimely if you did not file with reasonable diligence after notice from immigration authorities asserting the conviction as a basis for removal or denial of a benefit, or notice of a final removal order based on it. Once that paperwork arrives, your diligence is on the clock. The statute also presumes legal invalidity if you pleaded under a statute providing that, on completion of specific requirements, the arrest and conviction "shall be deemed never to have occurred."

On August 13, 2026 the California Supreme Court decided People v. Hernandez, reversing a denial that had rested largely on the defendant's initials beside the immigration advisement on her plea form and her attorney's signature on that form. A court "should consider the totality of the circumstances and focus on the defendant's subjective understanding," and evidence that you received the section 1016.5 advisement is "relevant, but not dispositive." Initials on a form are not the end of the inquiry.

The same opinion imposed a counterweight. A bare assertion that you did not understand the consequences "is insufficient to establish error; the assertion must be corroborated by objective evidence," which may include evidence about the quality of your counsel's representation and your interactions. What your lawyer actually did, and how they interacted with you, is where that corroboration comes from.

Error is only half of it. On prejudice, the test is a reasonable probability that you would not have pleaded had you correctly understood the actual or potential consequences and your options for defending against them. And "a reasonable probability does not mean more likely than not. Instead, it means merely a reasonable chance, which is more than an abstract possibility."

What SB 281 was aimed at runs opposite to the common assumption. The Court explained that the Legislature required the advisement "verbatim" so courts would use "may" rather than the more definitive language many trial courts were employing, because judges may not dispense legal advice to those before them.

Understand what winning gets you. If the court grants a motion to vacate a conviction obtained through a plea, it "shall allow the moving party to withdraw the plea." The conviction comes off the record and you resume facing the original charges. A rewind, not an eraser.

Three points are worth carrying into a consultation. The only finding a court must make on a subdivision (a)(1) motion is legal invalidity. A specific finding of ineffective assistance can issue only if that attorney got timely advance notice of the hearing. Every motion is entitled to a hearing, and the order is appealable.

California publishes a free form: Judicial Council Form CR-187 (opens in a new window), effective July 1, 2026, in English, Spanish, Korean, and Vietnamese.

Now the honest limit. A state-court vacatur is not automatically the end of the federal story. The Ninth Circuit has described section 1473.7 as a vehicle to address a substantive or procedural error rendering a conviction "legally invalid," and noted that its text does not permit a California court to vacate a conviction to alleviate immigration consequences. That case sent the matter back for the Board rather than deciding the vacatur eliminated the conviction.

And in a 2025 precedent decision, the Board held that an order reciting "section 1473.7" generally, with nothing showing the subdivision or the court's reasoning, did not meet the noncitizen's burden. What the order says, and what supports it, is part of the work.

Where published sources disagree, and what is actually certain

Some of this is genuinely unsettled. A flat answer on any of these four points is a warning sign about whoever gave it.

Vacated convictions

Pickering's reason-for-vacatur framework governs in the Ninth Circuit, where California sits. On August 24, 2026 the Fourth Circuit went the other way in Yanez Piedra v. Blanche, holding that the Board's framework "cannot govern because it conflicts with the statute's best reading" and that a court "may not consider vacated convictions" under 8 U.S.C. § 1182(a)(2)(A)(i). That decision is not binding in California, and a footnote cabins it: the court expressly did not address 8 U.S.C. § 1101(f)(8), or convictions expunged, set aside, or otherwise modified. This is a split, not a repeal.

The 364-day question

Both answers you have read are correct, for different systems. Section 18.5 applies retroactively under California law, and the Ninth Circuit has held that retroactivity does not carry over federally on pre-2015 misdemeanors. Anyone who gives you one half has given you half an answer.

Expungement

A section 1203.4 dismissal does not eliminate the conviction under the federal definition, and USCIS says so in its own naturalization guidance. What discretionary weight it carries in a particular application belongs to an immigration lawyer with your file.

The verbatim advisement

SB 281's requirement took effect January 1, 2026, and the Legislature said it did not intend a non-verbatim advisement to be grounds for vacating a plea accepted before that date. What happens on a plea taken on or after that date has not been addressed in a published decision.

One caution about currency. Under California Rules of Court, rule 8.532(b)(1), a Supreme Court decision becomes final 30 days after filing unless the court orders otherwise, so a decision filed August 13, 2026 stays open to rehearing or modification into September. Most published summaries of this area predate the 2026 developments above and still describe the earlier rules.

What to do this week

Get the actual record of your case. Not your memory of it, and not the charge name. You need the specific code section and subdivision you were convicted under, the sentence the judge imposed, and the disposition date. Everything on this page turns on those three items, because the elements of the statute and the numbers on the judgment are what the federal analysis reads.

If your case is still open, use the leverage California gave you. Section 1016.3 makes accurate and affirmative advice your lawyer's statutory duty, and makes avoiding adverse immigration consequences something the prosecutor must weigh in plea negotiations. Ask for both, ask in writing, and remember that you are not required to disclose your immigration status to the court.

If your case is closed, the official route is free. Start at the California Courts self-help guide on record cleaning for non-citizens (opens in a new window), which states the rule plainly: before you plead guilty or no contest, the judge must tell you that you could be deported, and your attorney must tell you how the plea will affect your immigration status. Form CR-187 is the filing, and it exists in Spanish, Korean, and Vietnamese as well as English.

Then get two assessments rather than one. A California criminal defense lawyer can work on the disposition and the record; only an immigration lawyer can tell you what a disposition does to your status. Boyadzhyan Legal Shield offers a free consultation, and walking in with the code section, the sentence, and the date will get you further than describing what happened.

Official Sources

• 8 U.S.C. § 1101 — definitions, including "conviction" at (a)(48)(A) and "aggravated felony" at (a)(43) (opens in a new window)
• 8 U.S.C. § 1227 — deportable aliens, criminal grounds (opens in a new window)
• 8 U.S.C. § 1182 — inadmissible aliens, criminal grounds and the petty offense exception (opens in a new window)
• 8 U.S.C. § 1229b — cancellation of removal and the stop-time rule (opens in a new window)
• California Penal Code § 1016.2 — legislative codification of Padilla v. Kentucky (opens in a new window)
• California Penal Code § 1016.3 — defense counsel's and the prosecution's duties (opens in a new window)
• California Penal Code § 1016.5 — the plea advisement, as amended by SB 281 effective January 1, 2026 (opens in a new window)
• California Penal Code § 1473.7 — motion to vacate a conviction or sentence (opens in a new window)
• California Penal Code § 18.5 — the 364-day maximum for county jail misdemeanors (opens in a new window)
• California Penal Code § 1203.4 — dismissal after probation, and what it preserves (opens in a new window)
• California Penal Code § 1000 — pretrial diversion in drug cases (opens in a new window)
• People v. Hernandez (2026) No. S282186, California Supreme Court, August 13, 2026 (opens in a new window)
• California Courts Self-Help Guide — record cleaning for non-citizens (opens in a new window)
• Judicial Council of California Form CR-187 — motion to vacate a conviction or sentence (opens in a new window)
• USCIS Policy Manual, Volume 12, Part F, Chapter 2 — expunged and vacated records (opens in a new window)
• Velasquez-Rios v. Wilkinson (9th Cir. 2021) 988 F.3d 1081 (opens in a new window)
• Bent v. Garland (9th Cir. 2024) 115 F.4th 934 (opens in a new window)
• Matter of De Jesus-Platon, 29 I&N Dec. 7 (BIA 2025) (opens in a new window)
• Yanez Piedra v. Blanche, No. 25-1258 (4th Cir. Aug. 24, 2026) (opens in a new window)
• Moncrieffe v. Holder (2013) 569 U.S. 184 — the categorical approach (opens in a new window)
• Pereida v. Wilkinson (2021) 592 U.S. 224 (opens in a new window)
• Padilla v. Kentucky (2010) 559 U.S. 356 (opens in a new window)
• Matter of Devison-Charles, 22 I&N Dec. 1362 (BIA 2000) (opens in a new window)