On March 10, 2023, WLF asked the en banc Eleventh Circuit to affirm a trial-court decision that correctly refused to allow state tort law to override federal regulatory law. The case arises from a failure-to-warn claim by a plaintiff who contends that his cancer was caused by his exposure to the popular herbicide Roundup. But EPA, the agency charged with enforcing federal regulatory law, has rejected any cancer-related warning on Roundup as scientifically unwarranted, false, and misleading. In its amicus brief supporting Monsanto, WLF argues that state tort law should not be allowed to flout express preemption provisions in federal law by undermining the congressionally mandated, science-based regulation of herbicide labeling. Imposing state tort liability for failing to provide a label warning that EPA has determined is false and misleading, and thus should not be provided, would place manufacturers like Monsanto in an impossible quandary. WLF joined the amicus brief of Atlantic Legal Foundation, authored by Larry Ebner of Capital Appellate Advocacy.
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