Justice Kavanaugh continued in relevant part: Statutory structure reinforces that §666 is a bribery statute, not a two-for-one bribery-and-gratuities statute as the Government posits. The Government identifies no other provision in the U. S. Code that prohibits bribes and gratuities in the same provision. And §201 does not do so. That is because bribery and gratuities are “two separate crimes” with “two different sets of elements.” United States v. Sun-Diamond Growers of Cal., 526 U. S. 398, 404.
For federal officials, Congress has separated bribery and gratuities into two distinct provisions of §201 for good reason: crimes receive different punishments that “reflect their relative seriousness.” Sun-Diamond, 526 U. S., at 405. For example, accepting a bribe as a federal official is punishable by up to 15 years in prison, while accepting an illegal gratuity as a federal official is punishable by up to only 2 years. If the Government were correct that §666 also covered gratuities, Congress would have inexplicably authorized punishing gratuities to state and local officials five times more severely than gratuities to federal officials—10 years for state and local officials compared to 2 years for federal officials. The Government cannot explain why Congress would have created such substantial sentencing disparities.
Interpreting §666 as a gratuities statute would significantly infringe on bedrock federalism principles. Generally, States have the “prerogative to regulate the permissible scope of interactions between state officials and their constituents.” McDonnell v. United States, 579 U. S. 550, 576. The differing approaches by the state and local governments reflect policy judgments about when gifts expressing appreciation to public officials for their past acts cross the line from the innocuous to the problematic. Those carefully calibrated policy decisions would be gutted if the Court were to accept the Government’s interpretation of §666. Reading §666 to create a federal prohibition on gratuities would suddenly subject 19 million state and local officials to a new and different regulatory regime for gratuities. The Court should hesitate before concluding that Congress prohibited gratuities that state and local governments have allowed. After all, Congress does not lightly override state and local governments on such core matters of state and local governance.
There is an irony in referencing the 19 million state and local officials while also referencing principles of federalism and the framer of our Constitution. It was the intent of the framers to have a government that is only involved in what is essential to maintain peace and order. The existence of 19 million state and local government officials undermines the framers’ intent.
