The U.S. Supreme Court ruled 6-3 on Tuesday that foreign plaintiffs cannot use two key federal statutes to sue American companies for allegedly aiding human rights abuses abroad, sharply restricting international litigation against U.S. corporations operating in complex global markets.
The decision in Cisco Systems, Inc. v. Doe centers on whether federal courts have authority to recognize private lawsuits under the 1789 Alien Tort Statute and the 1991 Torture Victim Protection Act. The ruling will significantly reshape how victims of state-sponsored abuse can pursue claims in American courts when U.S. companies are accused of providing material support to foreign regimes.
What Happened
Writing for the conservative majority, Justice Amy Coney Barrett held that federal judges lack constitutional authority to create new private causes of action under the Alien Tort Statute and that the Torture Victim Protection Act does not support secondary aiding-and-abetting liability. “Today, we close the door that Sosa cracked and hold that courts may not create new causes of action for violations of international norms,” Barrett wrote, referring to the court’s 2004 precedent. “We also hold that the Torture Victim Protection Act of 1991, which contains an express cause of action, does not provide for aiding-and-abetting liability.”
Barrett was joined by Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, and Brett Kavanaugh. The case originated from a lawsuit brought by practitioners of Falun Gong, a religious movement banned by the Chinese government, alleging that Cisco Systems sold surveillance and networking infrastructure used in detention and torture. While a federal district court initially dismissed the complaint, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit revived the claims, ruling that both statutes permitted actions against domestic companies that knowingly facilitate human rights violations.
The Supreme Court’s reversal ends that legal theory. The majority reasoned that creating private rights of action is a legislative prerogative exclusively reserved to Congress. Allowing unelected federal judges to recognize new tort claims based on evolving international norms, the court stated, risks judicial overreach into foreign policy—a domain the Constitution assigns to the executive and legislative branches.
The Reaction
The decision aligns with arguments presented by the federal government. The Solicitor General’s office had urged the justices to rein in extraterritorial litigation, warning that expansive corporate liability could disrupt foreign diplomacy, invite reciprocal foreign litigation against U.S. interests, and chill American technological innovation abroad.
Business groups and defense counsel celebrated the ruling. Corporate defendants had faced expansive class actions under the Alien Tort Statute for decades, incurring substantial litigation costs to defend against claims stemming from foreign government actions. The decision removes what companies characterized as a perpetual cloud of legal exposure.
The court’s three liberal justices voiced sharp disagreement. Justice Sonia Sotomayor argued that the plain text of the Torture Victim Protection Act naturally includes those who intentionally aid and abet underlying conduct. “Because the plain text of this statute includes individuals who aid and abet the victim’s torture, I would affirm the Ninth Circuit’s judgment,” she wrote. Justice Elena Kagan joined that analysis, while Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson agreed that the statute’s framework was sufficiently broad to reach parties providing material, knowing assistance to state-sponsored torture, though she found narrowing aspects of the Alien Tort Statute appropriate.
What This Means
The ruling marks a significant consolidation of conservative judicial doctrine limiting transnational human rights suits in U.S. courts. It establishes that foreign policy remedies must originate through Congress rather than through judge-made tort claims, cementing a principle that has developed across decades of rulings on extraterritorial jurisdiction.
For multinational corporations and technology firms, the decision removes a category of litigation exposure when operating in countries with poor human rights records. For international claimants alleging complicity by American companies in state-sponsored abuses, the pathway to American courts has now substantially narrowed. The practical effect shifts responsibility for addressing such harms to legislative action, diplomatic channels, and foreign legal systems rather than private civil litigation in federal courts.
