SCOTUS to Hear Roundup Liability Case

LINCOLN, Neb. (DTN) -- The U.S. Supreme Court decided Friday it will hear a Bayer Roundup case that could bring product-liability lawsuits to a close on the glyphosate-based weed killer.

Bayer argued the Supreme Court should hear Monsanto Company v John L. Durnell to resolve a split among lower courts on whether federal labeling laws preempt state labeling laws, while attorneys for the non-Hodgkin's lymphoma patient Durnell contended there was not a lower-court split.

Last summer the Missouri Court of Appeals joined the U.S. Court of Appeal for the Ninth and 11th circuits and state appellate courts in California and Oregon in holding that federal law does not preempt state laws. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit ruled the opposite in another case, according to Bayer's filing.

Bayer touted the news as an important decision for U.S. agriculture.

"The Supreme Court decision to take the case is good news for U.S. farmers, who need regulatory clarity," Bayer CEO Bill Anderson said in a statement.

"It's also an important step in our multi-pronged strategy to significantly contain this litigation. It is time for the U.S. legal system to establish that companies should not be punished under state laws for complying with federal warning label requirements."

In a brief filed with the Supreme Court, the U.S. Solicitor General agreed with the company that the court should hear the case to resolve the circuit split.

"EPA has repeatedly determined that glyphosate is not likely to be carcinogenic in humans, and the agency has repeatedly approved Roundup labels that did not contain cancer warnings," the solicitor general said in the brief.

"This court's intervention is warranted to give FIFRA's preemption provision its proper force."

Lori Ann Burd, environmental health director at the Center for Biological Diversity, said it was a "sad day in America" when the Supreme Court decides to consider "depriving thousands of Roundup users suffering from cancer" of their day in court.

"Bayer is seeking the court's intervention because juries armed with compelling scientific studies linking Roundup to cancer have awarded billions to cancer victims," Burd said.

"Bayer keeps losing on the facts about its own product so now it's asking the court to prevent juries from ever again hearing those facts."

Durnell's attorneys argued in briefs to the Supreme Court that the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act, or FIFRA, required Bayer to seek approval for a modified Roundup label that included a cancer warning.

Durnell's brief said the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit's decision in Schaffner v Monsanto Corp. -- the only case Bayer cites as creating a split -- declined to address the key preemption question in Durnell's case.

Bayer has argued the Third Circuit was correct when it unanimously held in Schaffner that FIFRA expressly preempts a claim like Durnell's that would require a warning label that is different from one mandated by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

The Roundup lawsuits are based on alleged failure-to-warn claims by individual plaintiffs that say glyphosate in Roundup caused their cancer.

Bayer's petition filed on April 4, 2025, was in response to the verdict in Durnell v Monsanto. In the case the Missouri Court of Appeals upheld a $1.25 million verdict based solely on a state-law failure-to-warn claim.

The Schaffner case addressed just one option for updating product labeling (notification without approval) but did not address the second option of applying for amended registration -- which requires EPA approval.

Attorneys for Durnell argue that unlike the plaintiff in Schaffner, he has consistently maintained that FIFRA requires Bayer to seek EPA approval for a modified Roundup label with cancer warnings.

Schaffner's reasoning rested on the assumption that Bayer had no option to update Roundup's labeling.

Durnell's brief points out this assumption is false -- as evidenced by Bayer updating Roundup's labeling 44 times and proposing to add cancer information in a settlement of multidistrict litigation.

Read more on DTN:

"SCOTUS to Decide on Bayer Roundup Case," https://www.dtnpf.com/….

Todd Neeley can be reached at todd.neeley@dtn.com

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