BUFKIN v. COLLINS

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

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No. 23–713

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JOSHUA E. BUFKIN, PETITIONER v. DOUGLAS A. COLLINS, SECRETARY OF VETERANS AFFAIRS

NORMAN F. THORNTON, PETITIONER v. DOUGLAS A. COLLINS, SECRETARY OF VETERANS AFFAIRS

on writ of certiorari to the united states court of appeals for the federal circuit

 Justice Jackson, with whom Justice Gorsuch joins, dissenting.

 The Court draws two conclusions from today’s evaluation of Congress’s “take due account” admonition. See 38 U. S. C. §7261(b)(1). First, it holds that when the United States Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims (Veterans Court) reviews the Department of Veterans Affairs’ (VA’s) application of the “benefit-of-the-doubt” rule, that appellate tribunal must use the “same” standards of review that apply to its assessment of any other VA claims determination. Ante, at 1. Second, the Court concludes that whether  evidence is in “approximate balance” for purposes of the benefit-of-the-doubt rule is a “predominantly factual determination” to be reviewed only for clear error. Ante, at 2.

 The majority is wrong in both respects. Nothing about the text, context, or drafting history of subsection (b)(1) demonstrates that “take due account” actually means “proceed as normal.” Reading the provision in that fashion, as the majority does, makes little sense. That interpretation  is also inconsistent with how we have treated identical language elsewhere in this same statute and renders meaningless the “take due account” command that Congress specifically amended §7261(b) to insert.

 The majority’s clear-error conclusion fares no better, insofar as its reasoning ignores what appellate courts do and what we have consistently said about substantially similar circumstances. That is, even if the majority were correct that subsection (b)(1) instructs the Veterans Court to carry on applying the usual standards, clear-error review would not be appropriate because whether the VA properly applied the benefit-of-the-doubt rule does not present a question of fact. The VA’s benefit-of-the-doubt determination poses, at most, a mixed question of law and fact—and one that is substantively indistinguishable from the kinds of mixed questions that this Court has long said are subject to de novo review on appeal.

 In short, the Court today concludes that Congress meant nothing when it inserted subsection (b)(1) in response to concerns that the Veterans Court was improperly rubberstamping the VA’s benefit-of-the-doubt determinations, and also that the Veterans Court is not obliged to do anything more than defer to those agency decisions notwithstanding Congress’s “take due account” direction. I respectfully dissent.

I

 Under the time-honored benefit-of-the-doubt rule, veterans asserting claims for service-connected disabilities are entitled to have any reasonable doubt on a material issue resolved in their favor. Congress codified this rule in 1988: Section 5107(b) of Title 38 states unequivocally that the VA must “give the benefit of the doubt to the claimant” whenever “there is an approximate balance of positive and negative evidence regarding any issue material to the” veteran’s benefits claim. This generous standard of proof honors the  sacrifices of those who have served in the Armed Forces.

 Recognizing the weighty interests at stake in cases that involve benefits for veterans, Congress’s 1988 legislation also established judicial review of the VA’s benefits decisions by the Veterans Court, a specialized Article I tribunal. Section 7261(a) lays out in detail the authority that the Veterans Court has been given. As relevant here, the Veterans Court is authorized to (1) “decide all relevant questions of law”; (2) “compel action of the Secretary unlawfully withheld or unreasonably delayed”; and (3) “hold unlawful and set aside” certain VA decisions. §§7261(a)(1)–(3). Notably, clause (4) of §7261(a) states that “in the case of a finding of material fact adverse to the claimant made in reaching a decision in a case before the [VA] with respect to benefits,” the Veterans Court shall “hold unlawful and set aside or reverse such finding if the finding is clearly erroneous.” §7261(a)(4).

 For present purposes, all parties agree that §7261(a) has always authorized the Veterans Court to review the VA’s application of the benefit-of-the-doubt rule. But judicial review of that issue proved illusory from the start, because the Veterans Court historically applied a deferential standard of review for assessing the VA’s benefit-of-the-doubt determinations. See, e.g., Gilbert v. Derwinski, 1 Vet. App. 49, 57–58 (1990); Wensch v. Principi, 15 Vet. App. 362, 367 (2001). As a result, veterans groups routinely complained to Congress that judicial review by the Veterans Court was inappropriately deferential. See, e.g., Hearing before the Senate Committee on Veterans’ Affairs, 107th Cong., 2d Sess., 47 (2002) (statement of the legislative director of a veterans group); see also Brief for Federal Circuit Bar Association as Amicus Curiae 11–14.

 Congress responded in 2002, when it amended §7261(b) to specifically require the Veterans Court to “take due account of ” the VA’s application of the benefit-of-the-doubt rule. §7261(b)(1). In its entirety, the amended subsection  (b) states:

 “(b) In making the determinations under subsection (a), the [Veterans] Court shall review the record of proceedings before the Secretary and the Board of Veterans’ Appeals . . . and shall—

 “(1) take due account of the Secretary’s application of section 5107(b) of this title; and

 “(2) take due account of the rule of prejudicial error.” §7261(b).¹

The plain text of §7261(b)(1) thus requires the Veterans Court to “take due account” of the VA’s obligations under the benefit-of-the-doubt rule when it reviews VA benefits determinations under §7261(a).

II

 The dispute before us concerns the meaning of subsection (b)(1)’s “take due account” clause. The majority and I agree that subsection (b)(1) imposes a “statutory command” that the Veterans Court “give appropriate attention to the VA’s work” related to its application of the benefit-of-the-doubt rule. Ante, at 9. But the majority concludes that the “appropriate attention due is that which is required under subsection (a).” Ibid. In my view, that holding is unmoored from subsection (b)(1)’s text, ignores §7261’s overall structure and drafting history, and renders entirely superfluous Congress’s requirement that the Veterans Court “take due account” of the application of the benefit-of-the-doubt rule. The better reading of the statute recognizes that subsection (b)(1) requires the Veterans Court to determine, without  deference, whether the VA properly applied the benefit-of-the-doubt rule.

A

 The primary textual pillar of the majority’s conclusion that “[r]eview of the VA’s benefit-of-the-doubt decision is just another determination made ‘under subsection (a)’ ” is its observation that subsection (b)(1)’s review applies only “ ‘[i]n making the determinations under subsection (a).’ ” Ante, at 9 (quoting §7261(b)(1)). Based on that prefatory language, the majority reasons that subsection (b)(1) is merely an “aspect of ” the review that the Veterans Court performs under subsection (a), such that the “standards of review provided in subsection (a) also govern the Veterans Court’s review of benefit-of-the-doubt issues.” Ante, at 9.

 But the fact that the Veterans Court must apply subsection (b)(1) “[i]n making the determinations under subsection (a)” does not justify collapsing these two provisions. The word “in,” when paired with a gerund—here, “making”—is generally “equivalent in sense to a temporal clause introduced by when, while, if, [or] in the event of.” 7 Oxford English Dictionary 760 (2d ed. 1989) (emphasis in original). The “in making” clause in subsection (b) thus merely provides that when the Veterans Court makes one of the determinations authorized by subsection (a), it must also satisfy its duty to “take due account of ” the VA’s application of the benefit-of-the-doubt rule. In other words, the “in making” clause the majority seizes upon to justify its same- standards holding simply establishes that review under subsection (b)(1) occurs alongside review under subsection (a), not that they are the same thing.

 Interpreting subsection (b)(1) to require a separate, concurrent review of the VA’s compliance with the benefit-of-the-doubt rule is consistent with how this Court has interpreted subsection (b)(1)’s parallel provision—subsection  (b)(2). Subsection (b)(2) directs that, “[i]n making the determinations under subsection (a),” the Veterans Court shall “take due account of the rule of prejudicial error.” §7261(b)(2). In Shinseki v. Sanders, 556 U. S. 396 (2009), we held that subsection (b)(2) “requires the Veterans Court to apply the same kind of ‘harmless-error’ rule that courts ordinarily apply in civil cases,” id., at 406. We did not suggest—much less hold—that subsection (a)’s standards of review governed subsection (b)(2)’s “take due account” clause. To the contrary, we explained that the Veterans Court is not prevented from “directly asking the harmless-error question” and “resting its conclusion on the facts and circumstances of the particular case.” Id., at 408.

 Thus, there is no dispute that, under subsection (b)(2), the Veterans Court analyzes whether any error was harmless de novo, without applying the standards of review prescribed by subsection (a). And because subsection (a)’s standards do not apply when the Veterans Court “take[s] due account of the rule of prejudicial error” under subsection (b)(2), it is oddly discordant for the majority to conclude that those standards do apply when the Veterans Court “take[s] due account of the Secretary’s application of ” the benefit-of-the-doubt rule. See FCC v. AT&T Inc., 562 U. S. 397, 408 (2011) (“ ‘[I]dentical words and phrases within the same statute should normally be given the same meaning’ ”).

 An understanding of how subsection (b)(2)’s “take due account” language functions in practice further clarifies subsection (b)(1), as subsection (b)(2) existed prior to subsection (b)(1) and plainly served as its model. The majority does not dispute that the VA’s appellate tribunal, the Board of Veterans’ Appeals, sometimes applies the rule of prejudicial error in the first instance. See, e.g., Medrano v. Nicholson, 21 Vet. App. 165, 170 (2007).² If the Board determines that  an error was harmless and denies a veteran’s claim, then per subsection (b)(2), the Veterans Court reviews the record for prejudicial error and does so “de novo, in other words, without any deference to the Board,” before affirming. Id., at 171. Subsection (b)(1) works in precisely the same way: If the Veterans Court is inclined to affirm the VA’s denial of benefits, subsection (b)(1) requires it to first confirm de novo that the benefit-of-the-doubt rule was properly applied.

B

 Nor does the drafting history of the relevant provisions support the majority’s contention that subsection (b)(1) is an “aspect” of subsection (a), or that subsection (a)(4) substantively limits the review that subsection (b)(1) requires. In fact, the historical account suggests the opposite. The initial Senate bill amended subsection (a)(4)—rather than subsection (b)—to command that the Veterans Court “tak[e] into account” the VA’s application of the benefit-of-the-doubt rule. S. Rep. No. 107–234, p. 40 (2002) (italics deleted). That bill also proposed two other relevant changes: It authorized the Veterans Court to “reverse” the VA’s factual findings rather than remand them, and it eliminated the “clearly erroneous” standard of review. Ibid. (italics deleted). Accordingly, under the Senate’s bill, subsection (a)(4) would have authorized the Veterans Court to “set aside or reverse” any factual finding of the VA that was “unsupported by substantial evidence of record, taking into  account the Secretary’s application of ” the benefit-of-the-doubt rule. Ibid. (italics deleted).

 Had Congress adopted this proposal, the majority’s conflation of subsections (a) and (b)(1) might stand on firmer ground. But Congress plainly rejected that approach. It instead amended subsection (a)(4) only to empower the Veterans Court to reverse certain factual findings (i.e., those that are material and adverse to the claimant), and neither modified subsection (a)(4)’s clear-error standard nor inserted a requirement that the Veterans Court review the VA’s application of the benefit-of-the-doubt rule into that provision. §401, 116 Stat. 2832. At the end of the day, then, instead of incorporating a benefit-of-the-doubt-rule reminder into subsection (a)(4), Congress crafted an entirely new statutory provision—subsection (b)(1)—to address judicial review of the VA’s application of the benefit-of-the-doubt rule. Ibid.

 Recognizing that review under subsection (b)(1) is distinct from review under subsection (a)(4) respects Congress’s choice to separate those two provisions. It also comports with subsection (b)(1)’s language and the statute’s overall design. No one disputes that Congress sought to subject the VA’s benefit-of-the-doubt decisions to increased judicial scrutiny while otherwise preserving the VA’s not-clearly-erroneous factual findings. Reading subsection (b)(1) to be such a congressional mandate furthers that objective, while the majority’s conclusion that subsection (b)(1) implicitly incorporates subsection (a)(4)’s limited clear-error standard undermines it.

C

 The usual indicators of statutory meaning thus confirm that subsection (b)(1) was meant to have bite. But the majority’s reading renders it toothless. According to the majority, subsection (b)(1) does not impose any new obligation  on the Veterans Court; instead, that provision merely “underscores” the importance of §5107(b)’s benefit-of-the-doubt rule. Ante, at 10. At oral argument, the Government put the matter even more bluntly, arguing that subsection (b)(1) is an “exclamation point” that does “duplicate work” and is ultimately “redundant.” Tr. of Oral Arg. 42, 44. This interpretation, which the majority adopts, violates the “cardinal principle of statutory interpretation” that courts ordinarily “ ‘ “give effect, if possible, to every clause and word of a statute.” ’ ” Williams v. Taylor, 529 U. S. 362, 404 (2000) (quoting United States v. Menasche, 348 U. S. 528, 538–539 (1955)).

 The majority acknowledges that the surplusage argument is “a serious one” and that its interpretation “might involve some redundancy.” Ante, at 16. Still, the majority maintains that subsection (b)(1) has a “function” even if it performs zero independent work. Ibid. That is because, as the majority sees it, subsection (b)(1) makes “express” the Veterans Court’s duty to hear challenges to the VA’s application of the benefit-of-the-doubt rule under subsection (a), and may even require the Veterans Court to do so sua sponte. Ibid. But the majority cannot overcome the surplusage problem simply by asserting that subsection (b)(1) emphasizes or clarifies a pre-existing duty. To state the obvious, “most superfluous language” can be justified as providing “clarity.” NLRB v. SW General, Inc., 580 U. S. 288, 304 (2017). Perhaps for this reason, the majority does not identify any other case in which this Court held that Congress passed an amendment with no substantive effect.

 Moreover, the majority does not and cannot explain why any such expression of the Veterans Court’s duties was needed—much less why Congress would go out of its way to amend the statute to underscore an existing obligation. Subsection (a) covers the waterfront of possible exercises of judicial authority and has always required the Veterans Court to consider any argument “presented” by a veteran.  Subsection (a) cannot be reasonably read to exclude consideration of a veteran’s claim that the VA misapplied the  benefit-of-the-doubt rule. And no one actually thought this; indeed, prior to Congress’s enactment of subsection (b)(1), the Veterans Court regularly considered challenges to the VA’s application of the benefit-of-the-doubt rule—it just did so deferentially. See supra, at 3–4.

 Thus, the problem that Congress enacted subsection (b)(1) to address was not that the Veterans Court seemed to have limited authority under subsection (a). Nor was it that the Veterans Court was somehow unaware of its duty to review the VA’s application of the benefit-of-the doubt rule upon request. Rather, as I have explained, Congress enacted subsection (b)(1) after veterans service organizations brought to its attention how the Veterans Court was performing that review—i.e., it was giving too much deference to the VA’s benefit-of-the-doubt determinations. Ibid. Congress’s indisputable focus was on the improper degree of deference the Veterans Court was affording to the VA’s determinations, a target that the majority’s reading misses completely. Nor is the majority’s surplusage problem solved by the “possibility” that subsection (b)(1) requires sua sponte review of the VA’s benefit-of-the-doubt determinations. Ante, at 16. Even assuming that subsection (b)(1) seeks to effect that change, sua sponte review would make no difference unless the Veterans Court proceeds nondeferentially. A rubberstamp applied to every case remains a rubberstamp.

 Finally, the majority maintains that if Congress had intended for subsection (b)(1) to do anything other than underscore the pre-existing duty to consider challenges to the VA’s benefit-of-the-doubt determinations, it would have more clearly said so. Ante, at 13. That gets things exactly backwards. Ordinarily, when Congress amends a statute, “ ‘ “we presume it intends its amendment to have real and substantial effect.” ’ ” Husky Int’l Electronics, Inc. v. Ritz,  578 U. S. 355, 359 (2016) (quoting United States v. Quality Stores, Inc., 572 U. S. 141, 148 (2014)). The majority instead presumes that Congress intended to enact a do- nothing amendment. But if Congress had wanted to maintain the status quo, why enact subsection (b)(1) at all? The presumption is, and should be, that Congress expects a change when it goes through the trouble of amending a statute. And, here, the majority’s reasoning has plainly failed to overcome that presumption.

D

 The veterans canon resolves whatever lingering doubt might remain about the proper interpretation of subsection (b)(1). We have “long applied ‘the canon that provisions for benefits to members of the Armed Services are to be construed in the beneficiaries’ favor.’ ” Henderson v. Shinseki, 562 U. S. 428, 441 (2011) (quoting King v. St. Vincent’s Hospital, 502 U. S. 215, 220–221, n. 9 (1991)). Likewise, under the veterans canon, “interpretive doubt is to be resolved in the veteran’s favor.” Brown v. Gardner, 513 U. S. 115, 118 (1994).

 The veterans canon strongly supports interpreting subsection (b)(1) to represent more than Congress’s grandiloquence. Requiring subsection (b)(1) to affect the judicial review the Veterans Court provides aligns with the significance of the benefit-of-the-doubt rule and mitigates the unique problems that arise in veterans’ cases, including that veterans are “often unrepresented” before the VA. Sanders, 556 U. S., at 412. Veterans’ claims also often involve a considerable time lag that produces problems of proof, since no statute of limitations applies to such claims. D. Nagin, The Credibility Trap: Notes on a VA Evidentiary Standard, 45 U. Memphis L. Rev. 887, 894, 898 (2015). An appeal to the Veterans Court is generally a veteran’s “final opportunity” to correct the VA’s mistakes. Ante, at 4. Non deferential review of the VA’s benefit-of-the-doubt determinations plainly minimizes the risk that veterans with borderline claims will be denied benefits to which they are entitled.

 Therefore, the veterans canon “garnish[es] an already solid argument” based on the statute’s text and structure. Arellano v. McDonough, 598 U. S. 1, 14 (2023). Reading subsection (b)(1) as a standalone command that requires the Veterans Court to review the VA’s application of the benefit-of-the-doubt rule nondeferentially obviously favors veterans more than an interpretation that reduces the provision to an exclamation point.

III

 The majority does not stop at the mistaken conclusion that Congress enacted subsection (b)(1) for no reason other than to reiterate the Veterans Court’s pre-existing statutory duties. It also proceeds to analyze how a challenge to the VA’s application of the benefit-of-the-doubt rule fares when filtered through the authority conferred to the Veterans Court in subsection (a). In this regard, the majority reasons that part—but not all—of the VA’s application of the benefit-of-the-doubt rule must be reviewed for clear error. Ante, at 10. But in my view, the Court mischaracterizes the “approximate balance” assessment under §5107(b), which is the part of the analysis that is at issue here. The majority maintains that that aspect of the benefit-of-the-doubt rule involves the type of predominately factual finding that appellate courts ordinarily review with deference. Ante, at 12–13. Stated simply, such is not the case.

A

 To understand the majority’s mistake, one must first be clear eyed about the two steps that are necessary for  the Veterans Court to review the VA’s application of the  benefit-of-the-doubt rule. First, the Veterans Court identifies and reviews the VA’s relevant factual findings concerning the evidence presented. Then, the Veterans Court determines whether, based on the VA’s plausible factual findings, the “positive and negative evidence” is in “approximate balance” (what I call the approximate-balance standard).

 All agree that the clear-error standard applies to the VA’s factual findings regarding the evidence that the Veterans Court examines at step one. So, for example, the Veterans Court must accept the VA’s determination that a particular piece of evidence is reliable or that an individual medical examiner is qualified, unless those findings are clearly erroneous. It is at the second step—when the Veterans Court determines whether the evidence is in approximate balance—that questions of law come in.

 At step two, the Veterans Court is essentially being asked to decide whether a legal standard (“approximate balance”) has been satisfied on the established facts. As a general matter, this Court has long treated the application of a legal standard to a given set of facts as an exercise that poses a legal question. See, e.g., Guerrero-Lasprilla v. Barr, 589 U. S. 221, 227–228 (2020). What the majority misses in its effort to shoehorn §5107(b)’s approximate-balance inquiry into the question-of-fact category is the true nature of  that assessment, as well as the fact that making the  approximate-balance determination is more nuanced than simply weighing the evidence on hand.

 For one thing, the court must have a standard for deciding when the evidence before it is in “approximate balance” as a matter of law. In our common-law legal system, devising that standard happens over time, on a case-by-case basis. Therefore, applying it might well involve examining Veterans Court precedents concerning the meaning of “approximate balance,” as well as past cases that establish  when and under what circumstances certain kinds of evidence will be found to qualify. One can easily imagine a body of case law developing to illuminate the substantive and procedural contours of the approximate-balance inquiry and the factors that are to be considered. Thus, applying §5107(b)’s “approximate balance” test is in no way akin to “finding” a “material fact” that is ultimately subject to subsection (a)(4)’s clear-error review, as even the Government appeared to concede at oral argument. See Tr. of Oral Arg. 59. Rather, application of the “approximate balance” test presents a “classic mixed question of law” that requires applying a “legal standard” to “historical facts.” Ibid.

 Where Congress has not prescribed a standard of review for evaluating a mixed question, the appropriate degree of deference reflects “the nature of the mixed question” and “which kind of court . . . is better suited to resolve it.” U. S. Bank N. A. v. Village at Lakeridge, LLC, 583 U. S. 387, 395 (2018) (citing Miller v. Fenton, 474 U. S. 104, 114 (1985)). In general, trial courts’ “expertise” as factfinders justifies deference to their factual determinations. Anderson v. Bessemer City, 470 U. S. 564, 574–575 (1985). For this reason, appellate courts “usually” review with deference mixed questions that require resolving “case-specific factual issues.” U. S. Bank, 583 U. S., at 396. But, as I have already explained, that is not what is happening here.

 Even if the majority is correct to assume that §5107(b)’s “approximate balance” standard calls for a mere head-to-head weighing of the positive and negative evidence, that is still an insufficient basis upon which to rest the majority’s clear-error conclusion, because deference is “not always” given regarding such fact-specific inquiries. Ibid., n. 4. There are circumstances where de novo review is appropriate “even when answering a mixed question primarily involves plunging into a factual record.” Ibid.

 Consider one common example. Whether probable cause  existed to support a search or seizure in the Fourth Amendment context is a mixed question of law and fact that appellate courts review de novo. Ornelas v. United States,  517 U. S. 690, 696–699 (1996). And review of probable-cause determinations proceeds in two steps, just like the approximate-balance inquiry. At step one, the appellate court identifies the relevant historical facts and reviews them for clear error. Id., at 696–697, 699. At step two, the court decides whether an objectively reasonable police officer would believe that those facts establish probable cause to search. Id., at 696–697. The second step is a legal question that asks whether the facts satisfy a legal standard. Ibid.

 Another highly fact-sensitive inquiry is whether evidence presented at trial is sufficient to support a verdict—and appellate courts review that determination de novo as well. In a civil case, the trial court may grant judgment to a moving party as a matter of law after the nonmoving “party has been fully heard on an issue during a jury trial,” if it “finds that a reasonable jury would not have a legally sufficient evidentiary basis to find for the party on that issue.” Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 50(a)(1). When making this decision, the trial judge determines whether, reviewing the facts in the light most favorable to the nonmovant, the evidence is sufficient to meet the applicable evidentiary standard. Reeves v. Sanderson Plumbing Products, Inc., 530 U. S. 133, 150 (2000); see also 9B C. Wright & A. Miller, Federal Practice and Procedure §2524 (3d ed. 2008) (explaining that the  sufficiency-of-the-evidence inquiry is a legal question determined by the court). And, on appeal, the reviewing court undertakes the same sufficiency analysis by evaluating the evidence without any deference to the trial court’s determination. Ibid.; see also Reeves, 530 U. S., at 150.³

  These examples demonstrate that nondeferential appellate review of factbound legal issues is not unprecedented. And under §7261(b)(1), the Veterans Court must follow suit. Section 7261(b)(1) directs the Veterans Court to evaluate the VA’s approximate-balance decisions by first accepting the agency’s not-clearly-erroneous factual findings about the evidence presented and then determining whether that evidence satisfies the approximate-balance standard, without deference to the VA’s own conclusions. This analysis—which “has both legal and factual components,” ante, at 11—is plainly analogous to the sufficiency-of-evidence and probable-cause questions that appellate courts regularly review de novo.

B

 The majority dismisses these compelling parallels on the grounds that assessing the sufficiency of the evidence or determining the existence of probable cause are more “legal” than the approximate-balance inquiry. Ante, at 14–15. The majority further emphasizes that evaluating whether the evidence is approximately balanced for §5107(b) purposes is a “fact intensive” inquiry that is better left to the “tribunal below” than the appeals court. Ante, at 12–13. It also unfurls a surplusage argument of its own: If de novo review applies to the VA’s approximate-balance determination, the majority says, then subsection (b)(1) is superfluous under petitioners’ interpretation because that determination “would have been subject to de novo review even before the enactment of §7261(b)(1).” Ante, at 16.

 None of this reasoning is persuasive. To start, the majority’s efforts to distinguish sufficiency and probable-cause review from the approximate-balance inquiry fall flat. For example, according to the majority, the probable-cause inquiry is distinguishable because reviewing courts assess  probable cause from the standpoint of an objectively reasonable officer, and courts are required to consider and “refine over time” what a “hypothetical person” would deem reasonable as a matter of law. Ante, at 14. The majority says that sufficiency challenges likewise require courts to use a “legal lens, applying a hypothetical, objective standard”—i.e., what a reasonable jury could find. Ante, at 15.

 But the approximate-balance inquiry is not meaningfully different. Before the Veterans Court can determine whether the VA erred in deciding that the positive and negative evidence is not in “approximate balance,” it must first have an understanding of what “balanced” evidence looks like in this context. Identifying “balance” might involve a hypothetical and objective examination of the evidence—just like a review of the sufficiency of the evidence or probable cause. Imagine two doctors testify in favor of a claimant’s diagnosis and two doctors testify against it. Does the mere fact that the same number of witnesses are presented on both sides mean that the evidence is “balanced,” as a legal matter? The Veterans Court would need to develop a legal rule to decide. It would also need to decide how the quality of the evidence factors in: What if one of the doctors is the Nobel laureate who discovered the condition at issue while others are recent medical-school graduates? Does the testimony of a doctor who has examined the claimant balance evenly against one who has not?

 It is thus quite likely that legal standards will need to be developed to govern the assessment of “approximate balance”—which is why the majority is wrong to contend that resolving approximate-balance challenges will rarely produce generally applicable precedents. Ibid. Regardless, the mere fact that the assignment here involves a fact-intensive and “multi-faceted” decision—such that “ ‘one determination will seldom be a useful “precedent” for another’ ”—should not impede our recognition of the significant questions of law that are embedded in the application of the   approximate-balance standard. Ornelas, 517 U. S., at 698; see also Dupree v. Younger, 598 U. S. 729, 734 (2023) (observing that sufficiency challenges “depend on . . . the facts”).

 The majority’s attempt to distinguish probable cause from the approximate-balance standard because the latter is “a creature of statute,” ante, at 15, is similarly off base. To be sure, application of the benefit-of-the-doubt rule is not constitutional in nature. But this principle is not a mere statutory creation, either—it predates §5107(b) and in fact “dates back to the post-Civil War era.” Ante, at 3 (citing 50 Fed. Reg. 34454 (1985)); see also, e.g., H. R. Rep. No. 387, 46th Cong., 3d Sess., 132–133 (1881) (testimony of a Bureau of Pensions physician explaining that when the evidence left “room for doubt” regarding the extent of a veteran’s disability, the practice was to “give him the benefit of the doubt” if “he appear[ed] like an honest man”). In any event, the majority does not explain why the statutory-versus- constitutional distinction has any rational bearing on the amount of deference the Veterans Court owes to the VA’s benefit-of-the-doubt determinations.

 Speaking of statutes, it is also significant that, under the judicial review scheme Congress has crafted for veterans’ benefits claims, the Veterans Court is no ordinary appellate tribunal. The thrust of the majority’s reasoning seems to be that, as an “appellate court,” the Veterans Court should do what appeals courts typically do: defer to the lower tribunal’s assessment of these “ ‘case-specific factual issues.’ ” Ante, at 13. But the “contrast between ordinary civil litigation” and the statutory requirements for adjudicating veterans’ benefits claims “could hardly be more dramatic.” Henderson, 562 U. S., at 440.

 To begin, the institutional advantages that generally warrant deference to trial courts on factual issues do not exist in this context, because the final decisionmaker for the VA—the Board of Veterans’ Appeals—is itself an appellate  body. See id., at 431 (citing §§7101, 7104(a)). What is more, the Veterans Court is “an Article I tribunal” that Congress placed within “a unique administrative scheme.” Id., at 437–438. Such tribunals often develop “special ‘expertise’ ” that guides them “ ‘in making complex determinations in a specialized area of the law.’ ” Sanders, 556 U. S., at 412. And that is particularly true of the Veterans Court, which regularly reviews “case-specific raw material” in veterans’ cases. Ibid. This feature distinguishes the Veterans Court from Article III appellate courts because it gives that court the “experience” and “expertise,” Anderson, 470 U. S., at 574, that “enabl[e] it to make empirically based” judgments on fact-specific issues, Sanders, 556 U. S., at 412—such as whether the benefit-of-the-doubt rule applies.

 Considering these unique features of the Veterans Court and the legal landscape in which it operates, there is good reason to believe that the Veterans Court is actually “better suited to resolve” the approximate-balance inquiry than the VA itself. U. S. Bank, 583 U. S., at 395. This is especially so given the need for fairness and consistency in the application of the “approximate balance” standard.

 Thus, even though review of the VA’s approximate- balance determination requires applying a legal standard to a set of facts, the Veterans Court is well equipped to do so, and de novo review of the VA’s determination best promotes the “sound administration of justice.” Miller, 474 U. S., at 114. In concluding otherwise, the majority minimizes the “singular characteristics” of the review scheme at issue, Henderson, 562 U. S., at 440, and disregards Congress’s choice to task the Veterans Court with ensuring that the VA complies with the benefit-of-the-doubt rule.

 Finally, because §7261(a) unquestionably authorizes de novo review of questions of law, the majority contends that applying de novo review to the VA’s approximate- balance determinations would render subsection (b)(1) superfluous. Ante, at 16. But that reasoning assumes that it  was always clear that an approximate-balance challenge raises a legal question (an assumption belied by the very holding that the majority announces today). Quite to the contrary, before Congress enacted subsection (b)(1) to require that the Veterans Court “take due account” of the VA’s benefit-of-the-doubt determinations, that court—erroneously, in my view—reviewed benefit-of-the-doubt challenges with deference. See supra, at 3–4, 10. Properly understood, subsection (b)(1) accomplishes the clear and important mission of abrogating the Federal Circuit and Veterans Court cases requiring such deference. The majority simply ignores this point. See ante, at 16–17.

*  *  *

 In response to complaints that the Veterans Court was not doing enough to ensure that the VA was, in fact, giving the benefit of the doubt to veterans, Congress inserted into a demonstrably pro-claimant administrative scheme the requirement that the Veterans Court “take due account” of the VA’s application of the benefit-of-the-doubt rule. §7261(b)(1). The reading that the majority adopts today reduces that provision to a rhetorical flourish and all but ensures that the Veterans Court will continue rubberstamping the VA’s application of the benefit-of-the-doubt rule.

 If the majority’s holding is correct, then “Congress went through an awful lot to achieve relatively little.” Wilkinson v. Garland, 601 U. S. 209, 227 (2024) (Jackson, J., concurring in judgment). The far better reading of this statute—one that fully comports with the text, structure, context, history, and purpose of the provision Congress wrote—is that the Veterans Court must review without deference the VA’s approximate-balance determination, and thereby fully assess that agency’s compliance with Congress’s commands.