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This week’s newsletter discusses an update to the ongoing Monsanto litigation and lawsuits concerning physicians’ speech and conduct, mail access to mifepristone, and challenges to vaccine mandates. To access any of our previous newsletters, you can find them archived here.
Roundup Litigation Updates
Complications continue with lawsuits concerning Monsanto’s Roundup weedkiller, following U.S. Supreme Court oral arguments in Monsanto v. Durnell (Docket No. 24-1068), which we covered in our May 8 newsletter. The central question in Durnell is whether a company can be held liable in state court for failing to include a product warning label when the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) does not require such a warning. Now, a separate proposed settlement for $7.25 billion that covers thousands of claims that Monsanto failed to warn that Roundup could cause cancer, may be delayed as 10 objectors to the settlement have filed to move the case to federal court instead of state court in Missouri, where Monsanto is based.
The proposed settlement was filed in February in St. Louis Circuit Court and addresses most pending Roundup lawsuits. The settlement calls for Bayer, who acquired Monsanto in 2018, to make annual payments into a special fund for up to 21 years to pay out to individuals who used Roundup and were later diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma. The amount of the payout would depend on the nature of an individual’s cancer diagnosis, how long they used Roundup, and the age at which they were diagnosed. Those diagnosed at age 78 or older would get significantly less money than those diagnosed while younger than 60 years old. Opponents to the settlement, including Durnell’s attorney, argue that it was rushed into state court and would extinguish the rights of cancer victims, while both Bayer and the claimants agree that the move to federal court is a baseless delay tactic with no merit.
A 1941 U.S. Supreme Court decision, Shamrock Oil & Gas Corp. V. Sheets, held that only a defendant can move the case to federal court. The objectors may not have the legal standing to move the case out of state court, as they are not a party in the settlement, although the final decision may sit with U.S. District Judge Henry Autrey in St. Louis, who will decide if the case should be sent back to state court or remain in federal court.
Chat Bot Docs
In Commonwealth of Pennsylvania v. Character Technologies, Inc., the state of Pennsylvania is accusing an Character.AI of unlawful medical practice because it permits an AI system “character” to “engage in conversations with the public while the character holds itself out as a licensed medical doctor.”
The behavior at issue began after a Professional Conduct Investigator (“PCI”) for the Department of State, Bureau of Enforcement and Investigation created an account on Character.AI’s website and entered the search term “psychiatry.” That search generated a large number of AI characters, including Emilie, who offered to help the PCI complete an assessment for depression, according to the lawsuit. During this conversation, the lawsuit alleges that Emilie called themselves a doctor, claimed to have gone to medical school, stated that they had been practicing for seven years, and offered up an invalid medical license number. The issue is not an isolated one, as a recent report found similar behavior by chatbots on five different AI websites.
The lawsuit in Pennsylvania comes as research has shown that a significant number of adults under 30 (1 in 4), and a substantial amount of adults overall (1 in 6) use AI chatbots for medical advice at least once a month.
We will continue to track this case and provide updates as needed.
Gender-Affirming Care: Privacy Concerns
Several hospitals around the country are facing grand jury subpoenas from the U.S. Department of Justice seeking medical records related to gender affirming care, sparking concerns about the privacy of sensitive information.
NYU Langone Hospitals was among the hospitals that recently received a subpoena. The subpoena asked the hospital to turn over a wide range of documents related to gender affirming care, including “Documents sufficient to identify each patient who underwent Sex-Rejecting Procedures,” with a specific focus on minors in the subpoena. The DOJ’s actions prompted affected minors, parents, and other young adults to file a class action lawsuit, Coe v. Blanche, asking a federal judge in New York to find that the subpoenas violate the Fourth and Fifth amendments, along with New York state law. The Plaintiffs ultimately requested an injunction blocking the DOJ from seeking or receiving such records and the hospital from releasing them to the DOJ.
NYU isn’t the only hospital network that has been targeted, with the DOJ issuing at least 20 subpoenas to health care providers in 2025 and 2026 related to gender affirming care for minors. The Lucile Salter Packard Children’s Hospital at Stanford is another institution that received a subpoena. In response, transgender minors and young adults who have received care through the hospital network sued to block the records from being handed over in Z.A. v. Lucile Salter Packard Children’s Hospital at Stanford. On June 8, the California federal judge presiding over this case issued an emergency order requiring the Stanford hospital not to “produce additional records to the government” in response to the subpoena without a further order from the Court and instructed the government not to take additional actions to attempt to enforce the subpoena.
We will continue to track this issue and provide updates as needed.
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