Whether federal law through the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA) expressly or impliedly preempts state-law failure-to-warn claims regarding pesticide labeling

No question identified. : 2. This case implicates two major issues warranting this Court’s review: (1) the extent to which the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA), 7 U.S.C. §§ 136 et seg., expressly or impliedly pre-empts state-law claims based on a failure to warn; and (2) the constitutionality of duplicative and excessive awards of punitive damages based on the same underlying conduct. 3. Alleging that Roundup, a widely used glyphosate-based herbicide manufactured by Monsanto, caused three individuals—Daniel Anderson, Jimmy Draeger, and Valorie Gunther—to contract cancer, Respondents sued Monsanto asserting failure-to-warn and other claims. The jury awarded Respondents more than $61 million in compensatory damages and an additional $1.5 billion in punitive damages—an amount Respondents agreed was excessive and consented post-trial to reduce to $549.9 million (an amount Monsanto contends is still unconstitutional). 4. FIFRA requires that a pesticide be registered by EPA before it may be sold. 7 U.S.C. § 136a(a). For a pesticide to be registered, its manufacturer must submit a proposed warning label to the agency. 7 U.S.C. §§ 136a(c)(1)(C) & (c)(2). EPA may not register a pesticide unless it determines that the proposed label “compl|[ies] with the requirements of [FIFRA]’ (7 U.S.C. § 136a(c)(5)(B)), including the requirement that it “contain” any “warning or caution statement which may be necessary ... to protect health.” 7 U.S.C. § 136(q)(1)(G). Once EPA registers a pesticide, “any modification” to its labeling “must be approved by the Agency before the product, as modified, may legally be distributed or sold.” 40 C.F.R. § 152.44(a). In short, because “[s]pecific statements pertaining to the hazards of the product and its uses must be approved by the Agency” (40 C.F.R. § 156.70(c)), a manufacturer may sell a pesticide only “with the ... labeling currently approved by the Agency.” 40 C.F.R. § 152.130(a). 5. EPA first registered Roundup in 1974. EPA has never required the Roundup label to carry a cancer warning. To the contrary, the agency has repeatedly rejected any such warning, expressly advising Monsanto and other manufacturers of glyphosate-based pesticides that such a warning would “constitute a false and misleading statement.” EPA, Letter to Glyphosate Registrants, at 1 (Aug. 7, 2019). 6. The Missouri Court of Appeals rejected Monsanto’s preemption arguments, holding that FIFRA neither expressly nor impliedly preempts Respondents’ claims. The Missouri Court of Appeals also upheld a total damages award of $611 million—including $549.9 million in punitive damages—despite that (1) Monsanto has already paid nearly $100 million in punitive damages for what Plaintiffs admitted below was the same conduct at issue here, and (2) absent intervention by the courts, Monsanto faces endless punitive liability in thousands of other cases for this identical conduct. 7. The Missouri Court of Appeals’ decision on preemption reflects one side of a well-established lower-court conflict. While the Ninth and Eleventh Circuits and the California Court of Appeals have reached the same conclusion, the Third Circuit recently held that 7 U.S.C. § 136b(v) expressly preempts claims indistinguishable from those asserted by Respondents. Compare Carson v. Monsanto Co., 92 F.4th 980 (11th Cir. 2024); Hardeman v. Monsanto Co., 997 F.3d 941 (9th Cir. 2021); and Pilliod v. Monsanto Co., 67 Cal. App. 5th 591 (Cal. Ct. App. 2021), with Schaffner v. Monsanto Corp., 113 F.4th 364 (8d Cir. 2024). 8. Resolution of the conflict and of the constitutional questions raised by the duplicative punitive awards at issue in this case will have broad practical implications, as thousands of cases involving Roundup are currently pending in federal and state courts across the country and similar cases involving other pesticides could, and very likely will, arise in the future. 9. Monsanto requires more time to prepare the petition in this case. At t