SALEM, Ohio — The U.S. Supreme Court handed a major win to the maker of Roundup weedkiller while dealing a blow to thousands of cancer‑related lawsuits.
In a 7–2 ruling on June 25, the Supreme Court backed the maker of Roundup in “Durnell v. Monsanto Company,” a decision that is likely to shut down thousands of lawsuits claiming the company failed to warn users about cancer risks of the pesticide glyphosate. The case comes after years of litigation and some multi-billion-dollar verdicts against Bayer, the German company that bought Monsanto in 2018.
The Associated Press reported that the Supreme Court ruled Roundup cannot be sued in state courts for failing to warn about its product because federal regulators do not require a warning label and have found a cancer link unlikely. Bayer welcomed the ruling as a long‑sought validation of federal pesticide regulation, saying it “affirms that the EPA’s safety determination is the law of the land” and should “significantly contain” Roundup litigation by blocking state‑law warning claims.
The company also argued the outcome is good for American farmers and food security, restoring “regulatory clarity” so manufacturers aren’t punished under a “patchwork of state tort laws” for using EPA‑approved labels, according to a company statement.
State tort laws are the rules that let people sue in state courts when they believe they’ve been harmed by a company’s product or conduct — for example, claiming a weedkiller maker failed to warn them about health risks. They’re separate from federal regulations and can require companies to pay damages even when the product’s label has been approved by a federal agency like the EPA.
Then-Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost joined Texas and Florida in filing an amicus brief in the case urging the Supreme Court to preserve state failure‑to‑warn lawsuits, a type of state tort claim. The states argued that people should still be able to sue pesticide manufacturers in state court under tort laws if they believe the company failed to warn them about health risks, even if the EPA approved the product’s label.
Emphasizing that they were “tak[ing] no position on the merits” of whether glyphosate causes cancer, the states instead argued that EPA approval of a pesticide label should not automatically shield manufacturers from state‑law claims because “a registered pesticide sold with a label approved by EPA can still be misbranded in violation of federal law.”
The ties between glyphosate use and cancer are still debated. The World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer classified the chemical as “probably carcinogenic” in 2015.
Bayer disputes the cancer claims but previously set aside $16 billion to settle cases, and earlier this year proposed a $7.25 billion class-action settlement. A federal judge recently ruled that the proposed settlement will be heard in a Missouri state court, where many of the lawsuits have been filed.
About 200,000 Roundup-related claims have been made against Bayer, mostly from home users. The company stopped using glyphosate in Roundup sold in the U.S. residential lawn and garden market, according to the AP.
Commodity crop groups, including the National Corn Growers Association, American Soybean Association and National Association of Wheat Growers, applauded the Supreme Court’s decision. The National Association of Wheat Growers called it “a win for farmers and the broader agricultural community.”
“This is great news for all farmers in the country,” said Jed Bower, Ohio farmer and National Corn Growers Association president, in a statement. “Today’s decision reaffirms that FIFRA is the law of the land and states cannot add undue and unproven requirements not backed by science.”
A dozen farm groups, including the NCGA, ASA, NAWG and the American Farm Bureau Federation, filed an amicus curiae brief with the Supreme Court earlier this year to “defend farmer access to critical crop protection tools against continued threats of regulatory overreach and activist litigation,” according to an American Soybean Association statement.
Environmental and public health advocates blasted the decision as a victory for chemical makers and a major setback for people who say they were harmed by pesticides.
The Environmental Working Group warned the ruling could set a precedent for other industries to seek similar immunity. Advocates say it will now fall to Congress and state legislatures to tighten pesticide laws, ban the most dangerous products and restore legal avenues for people seeking to hold manufacturers accountable.
“The ultimate losers are the American people,” said Ken Cook, president and co-founder of EWG. “People who were exposed, workers who were never warned, consumers who trusted a label – they now have fewer tools to use to fight back. And the corporations responsible for that harm have more protection than ever.”
