The Supreme Court seemed divided Monday over whether to block thousands of lawsuits alleging that the maker of the weedkiller Roundup failed to warn people it could cause cancer. The case landed before the justices after a tidal wave of litigation that included some multibillion-dollar verdicts against Bayer, the global agrochemical manufacturer that owns Roundup maker Monsanto.
Who Pays for the Poison
The people at the bottom of this fight are not the corporate lawyers or the regulators. They are the workers, neighbors and home users who say they were exposed to Roundup and later got sick. The case before the court was filed by a Missouri man named John Durnell. His lawsuit said he developed non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma after more than 20 years of serving as the neighborhood association’s “spray guy,” using Roundup on parks in his historic St. Louis community. A jury agreed that the company failed to warn him about possible cancer dangers and awarded him $1.25 million.
That verdict is one of thousands of similar cases, including some multibillion-dollar damage awards. Bayer disputes the cancer claims, but the scale of the litigation shows how many people have been dragged into the fallout from a product sold under corporate and regulatory cover.
The Corporate Defense, Backed by the State
Several justices seemed sympathetic to the company’s argument that it cannot be sued under state law because federal regulators have found Roundup likely does not cause cancer. Others questioned whether that would wrongly stop states from responding to changing research. Roundup maker Monsanto is backed by the Trump administration, a legal position that is at odds with some allies in the Make America Healthy Again movement who want to rein in pesticide use.
The company’s argument is simple enough: federal approval should shield it from state lawsuits. Bayer argues that it is required to follow federal standards, not the state laws that Durnell and others have sued under. The Environmental Protection Agency has determined that glyphosate is not likely to be carcinogenic to humans when used as directed, and the agency approved a label without a cancer warning.
But the scientific record cited in the case is not settled in the way corporate lawyers would like it to be. The World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer classified glyphosate as “probably carcinogenic” in 2015. That clash between institutions is now being used as a battleground over who gets to decide what warning, if any, reaches the public.
What the Court Is Arguing Over
EPA reviews its labeling determinations every 15 years, which can be a relatively long period in terms of scientific advancement, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson said. Chief Justice John Roberts questioned whether waiting for EPA review ties the hands of state courts. “Throughout that long process, in response to information that suggests there is a risk that’s not on the label, the states cannot do anything?” he asked.
Durnell’s lawyers said federal law does not stop Bayer from putting a warning about possible cancer risk on its products under state law. Justices Brett Kavanaugh and Elena Kagan both seemed concerned that facing liability under a thicket of different state laws could make it tough for companies and undermine the purpose of federal regulations. “Do you think it’s uniformity when each state can require different things?” Kavanaugh said.
That exchange lays out the familiar machinery of control: federal regulators set the baseline, corporations seek protection from lawsuits, and ordinary people are left to prove harm one case at a time. The legal system becomes the arena where the injured are forced to beg for recognition while the company argues for immunity.
Bayer has set aside $16 billion to settle cases and proposed a major settlement earlier this year. At the same time, it has tried to persuade states to pass laws barring new cases, and a few have agreed. The company has faced more than 100,000 Roundup claims, mostly from home users. It has stopped using glyphosate in Roundup sold in the U.S. residential lawn and garden market. The company has said it might have to consider pulling glyphosate from U.S. agricultural markets if the lawsuits persist.
The American Farm Bureau Federation said in court documents that removing it from the market would have an “immediate, devastating risk to America’s food supply” at a time when the industry is already under pressure. Environmental groups say Bayer wants to keep juries out of the lawsuits because of its state court losses.
People in the Street, Institutions in the Courtroom
Outside the Supreme Court on Monday, dozens of MAHA activists and supporters gathered for what they called a “People vs. Poison” rally to decry Monsanto’s efforts to shield itself from lawsuits. That was the only direct action described in the case materials: people gathering to challenge a corporate legal shield while the justices weighed whether the system would keep protecting the company or allow more claims to move forward.
Pesticides have also created a rift between the administration and members of Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy’s MAHA movement, who were frustrated with an executive order aimed at boosting glyphosate’s production. Kennedy himself has said repeatedly that glyphosate causes cancer, even as he says he recognizes the executive order was necessary for food supply and national security reasons.
The Supreme Court is expected to decide the case by the end of June. For now, the machinery of state, corporate, and regulatory power is still grinding over the question of whether people harmed by Roundup can keep forcing their claims into court.