The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to review an appeal from Bayer, a major global agrochemical company, as it seeks to prevent thousands of state lawsuits. These lawsuits allege that Bayer failed to warn consumers about potential cancer risks associated with its widely-used weedkiller, Roundup.

The central issue for the justices is to determine whether the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) approval of Roundup, which did not include a cancer warning, should override claims made in state courts.

In an interesting twist, the Trump administration has shown support for Bayer, diverging from the Biden administration’s previous stance. This move places the administration at odds with certain backers of health-focused policies who are against granting Bayer the legal protections it is seeking.

While some scientific studies have linked glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup, to cancer, the EPA maintains that the chemical is unlikely to cause cancer in humans if used according to guidelines.

Despite disputing the cancer allegations, Bayer has allocated $16 billion to settle these claims. Concurrently, the company has lobbied for state laws that would prohibit such lawsuits, with success in states like Georgia and North Dakota.

The high court will take up a case from Missouri, in which a jury awarded $1.25 million to a man who developed non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma after spraying Roundup on a community garden in St. Louis.

The Supreme Court in 2022 declined to hear a similar claim from Bayer in a California case that awarded more than $86 million to a married couple.

But Germany-based Bayer, which acquired Roundup maker Monsanto in 2018, contends the Supreme Court should intervene now because lower courts have issued conflicting rulings. In 2024, the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in Bayer’s favor.

Bayer faces about 181,000 Roundup claims, mostly from residential users. It has stopped using glyphosate in Roundup sold in the U.S. residential lawn and garden market. But glyphosate remains in agricultural products. It’s designed to be used with genetically modified seeds, including corn, soybeans and cotton, that resist the weedkiller’s deadly effect. It allows farmers to produce more while conserving the soil by tilling it less.

Bayer has said it might have to consider pulling glyphosate from U.S. agricultural markets if the lawsuits persist.

“It is time for the U.S. legal system to establish that companies should not be punished under state laws for complying with federal warning label requirements,” Bayer CEO Bill Anderson said in a statement.

Environmental groups said Bayer wants to keep juries out of the lawsuits because it keeps losing in state courts.

“It’s a sad day in America when our highest court agrees to consider depriving thousands of Roundup users suffering from cancer of their day in court,” said Lori Ann Burd, environmental health director at the Center for Biological Diversity.

It’s unclear if the case will be argued in the spring or at the start of the next court term, in October.