{"id":3448,"date":"2026-10-06T20:56:49","date_gmt":"2026-10-06T20:56:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/checkthenews.store\/?p=3448"},"modified":"2026-10-06T20:56:49","modified_gmt":"2026-10-06T20:56:49","slug":"%f0%9f%9a%a8-trump-stunned-supreme-court-rules-8-1-that-he-can-shocking-ruling-sends-waves-through-washington","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/checkthenews.store\/?p=3448","title":{"rendered":"\ud83d\udea8 **TRUMP STUNNED! \u2014 SUPREME COURT RULES 8-1 THAT HE CAN\u2026 SHOCKING RULING SENDS WAVES THROUGH WASHINGTON!**"},"content":{"rendered":"

In a major ruling limiting the reach of federal courts over overseas corporate conduct, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 6-3 on Tuesday that foreign plaintiffs cannot use the Alien Tort Statute or the Torture Victim Protection Act to sue American companies for allegedly aiding and abetting human rights abuses abroad.<\/em> The decision in Cisco Systems, Inc. v. Doe (No. 24-856) sharply restricts the ability of international claimants to haul U.S. corporations into domestic courts over technology sales and commercial ties to foreign regimes. Writing for the conservative majority, Justice Amy Coney Barrett held that federal judges lack the constitutional authority to create private causes of action under the 1789 Alien Tort Statute (ATS) and that the Torture Victim Protection Act of 1991 (TVPA) does not establish secondary aiding-and-abetting liability. Barrett was joined by Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, and Brett Kavanaugh.<\/p>\n

\u201cToday, we close the door that Sosa cracked and hold that courts may not create new causes of action for violations of international norms,\u201d Barrett wrote, referring to the court\u2019s 2004 precedent in Sosa v. Alvarez-Machain. \u201cWe 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.\u201d The litigation originated from a lawsuit brought by unnamed practitioners of Falun Gong, a religious movement banned by the Chinese government. The plaintiffs alleged that Beijing authorities subjected them to brutal persecution, arbitrary detention, and torture, aided in part by surveillance and networking infrastructure-specifically the \u201cGolden Shield\u201d project-engineered and sold by San Jose-based Cisco Systems and its top executives.<\/p>\n

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 aiding-and-abetting actions against domestic entities that knowingly facilitate violations of customary international law. The Supreme Court\u2019s reversal brings an end to that theory.<\/p>\n

Constitutional Separation of Powers<\/h2>\n

Emphasizing the constitutional separation of powers, Barrett reasoned that creating private rights of action is an extraordinary legislative prerogative reserved exclusively to Congress. Allowing unelected federal judges to recognize new tort claims based on evolving international norms, the majority noted, risks severe judicial encroachment on foreign policy-a realm the Constitution assigns to the executive and legislative branches. Because the ATS is strictly a jurisdictional statute and the TVPA\u2019s text makes no mention of secondary liability, the court held that Cisco could not be held liable.<\/p>\n

The ruling delivers a decisive victory to the multinational business community and aligns with arguments presented by the federal government. The Solicitor General\u2019s office had participated in oral argument supporting Cisco, urging the justices to rein in extraterritorial litigation that administration officials warned 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 decision, arguing that it removes a cloud of perpetual legal exposure for tech firms and global manufacturers operating in complex international markets.<\/p>\n

For decades, corporate defendants had faced expansive class actions under the ATS, incurring massive litigation costs to defend against claims stemming from the sovereign actions of foreign governments.<\/p>\n

Liberal Justices\u2019 Dissent<\/h2>\n

The court\u2019s three liberal justices voiced sharp disagreement with the majority\u2019s sweeping rollback of human rights litigation. Addressing the secondary liability question under the 1991 statute, Sotomayor argued that statutory text permitting claims against individuals who \u201csubject\u201d victims to abuse naturally includes those who intentionally aid and abet the underlying conduct. \u201cBecause the plain text of this statute includes individuals who aid and abet the victim\u2019s torture, I would affirm the Ninth Circuit\u2019s judgment on this score as well,\u201d she wrote.<\/p>\n

Justice Jackson issued a separate opinion concurring in part and dissenting in part, joined by Kagan. While Jackson agreed with narrowing aspects of the ATS\u2019s scope, she maintained that the TVPA\u2019s statutory framework was sufficiently broad to reach parties that provide material, knowing assistance to acts of state-sponsored torture.<\/p>\n

The ruling marks the culmination of a decades-long effort by conservative jurists to curtail transnational human rights suits in U.S. courts, cementing the principle that foreign policy remedies must originate in Congress rather than through judge-made tort claims.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In a major ruling limiting the reach of federal courts over overseas corporate conduct, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 6-3 on Tuesday that foreign plaintiffs cannot use the Alien Tort … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3449,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3448","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/checkthenews.store\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3448","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/checkthenews.store\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/checkthenews.store\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/checkthenews.store\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/checkthenews.store\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3448"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/checkthenews.store\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3448\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3450,"href":"https:\/\/checkthenews.store\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3448\/revisions\/3450"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/checkthenews.store\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3449"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/checkthenews.store\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3448"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/checkthenews.store\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3448"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/checkthenews.store\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3448"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}