What does Montgomery v. Caribe Transport II mean for your company?
The Supreme Court has Opined on FAAAA Preemption and the Safety Exception: So what does it mean?
On May 14,2026, the Supreme Court issued its opinion in Montgomery v. Caribe Transport II, LLC, et al. This case involved a motor vehicle collision resulting in serious bodily injury to the Plaintiff, Montgomery. The Plaintiff had sued the motor carrier and the freight broker that had hired the motor carrier on behalf of the shipper. The plaintiff’s theory was that CH Robinson had been negligent in choosing to hire Caribe due to a conditional safety rating issued by the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA). CH Robinson argued that the Federal Aviation Administration Authorization Act (FAAAA) preempted state law claims against freight brokers. The Plaintiff responded to this argument by citing the safety exception contained within FAAAA, excepting state law safety regulations with respect to motor vehicles. The Seventh Circuit agreed with CH Robinson, and the Supreme Court has now reversed that decision on the basis of that safety exception.
First, I think it is important to note that this case does not affect FAAAA preemption of other state law claims against brokers that are not related to the safe operation of motor vehicles. The Court specifically addressed the concern of shrinking or eliminating FAAAA preemption, when it clarified as follows:
C.H. Robinson and the United States contend that construing the safety exception as Montgomery requests would swallow the FAAAA’s express preemption provision whole. In other words, everything that Congress preempted would also qualify for the safety exception. Not so. Recall that the express preemption provision applies to laws and regulations “related to a price, route, or service of ” motor carriers or brokers “with respect to the transportation of property.” §14501(c)(1). The safety exception saves only a subset of preempted claims: those involving regulations concerning motor vehicle safety.§14501(c)(2)(A). One can imagine many state laws that are related to motor carrier prices, routes, and services—such as how much a carrier may charge or which highways it may traverse—that have no relationship to safety. [emphasis added].
It is compelling that the Court imagines many state laws that remain preempted against freight brokers. Anything concerning pricing, routing, or the service provided – the arrangement of freight carriage and handling. It does not require a logical leap to find that this case is helpful in freight claim defense on behalf of freight brokers.
Throughout both the Opinion and the Concurrence, the focus is on motor vehicle safety and the right of state law to provide for safety to the public on its roadways. The “Safety Exception”, 49 USC §14501(c)(2)(A), provides that the preemptive effect of the statute “shall not restrict the safety regulatory authority of a State with respect to motor vehicles.” The Court found that an automobile collision inherently and necessarily is an event with respect to motor vehicles, so a state common law cause of action for liability is within the exception because its purpose is to promote safety in motor vehicle operation.
In this line of inquiry the Court references the allegations in this claim: that Caribe had a ‘subpar rating’ and “C.H. Robinson knew (or should have known) that choosing Caribe Transport to move goods was reasonably likely to cause an accident.” The Court found that “most obviously” based upon these allegations that selecting a carrier involves motor vehicles.
Again, I note that this logic does not carry over to the context of freight claims. A safety rating from the FMCSA does not include any data or analysis in regard to cargo claims. The FMCSA does not keep or maintain any rating or publicly available information whatsoever in that regard. Moreover, it is considerably removed from the safety of citizens on the roadway as to whether or not a crate of widgets was damaged during shipping, so long as no motor vehicle collision has occurred. The Concurrence agrees on this point specifically when addressing the concerns of the brokerage industry: “Importantly, the Court’s decision today should not be read to mean that brokers will routinely be subject to state tort liability in the wake of truck accidents.” This language explicitly contextualizes the analysis – ‘are truck accident cases preempted.’
The other thing that this opinion does is to clarify that state law claims are preempted against brokers for intrastate service with no safety exception. The Court stated that it will “live with the mystery” as to why congress chose to restrict state power for service solely within that state, but not when the goods are moving interstate. The result is an odd quirk. The holding is clear: Intrastate brokers have full preemption. The Concurrence referenced this as creating “a substantial anomaly.”
As for the defense of injury claims resulting from traffic accidents in interstate shipments, which are now quite clearly not preempted when brought against brokers on a theory of negligent hiring, the Concurrence from Justice Kavanaugh suggests that the court’s decision is largely based upon the fact that negligence law provides a defense to brokers in this context. “…[B]rokers should be able to successfully defend against state tort suits if the brokers have acted reasonably … the proximate-cause requirement in typical state tort law should help protect brokers from excessive liability.”
To that end, my advice to freight brokers remains consistent and mostly unchanged by this ruling. I advise my clients to maintain carriers files with documentation of their qualification, such as: insurance, authority, basic corporate information, and any specific selection criteria. Further, it is inadvisable to do business with any carrier that has a poor safety rating, no data, fewer than five years on their MC # and fewer than five trucks. Of course, exceptions can arise, and safe carriers can exist with fewer trucks and time, but such situations should involve further inquiry. Given the ruling in Montgomery (and the all-too-common overreading of the breadth of Supreme Court Opinions), it would also seem advisable for brokers to treat conditional safety ratings as a disqualifying, without further evidence of corrective action and fitness.
Other considerations are obtaining proper insurance policies to provide a defense. The benefit of FAAAA prevention in defense is that procedurally, you make that argument at the pleading stage. Now, in auto accident cases that will no longer be available, and the effect will be to greatly increase defense costs. Justice Kavanaugh’s Concurrence suggests, and the questions from he and Justice Thomas clarified the belief that proximate cause provided plenty of protection from adverse judgments for brokers acting reasonably. What that fails to evaluate is the cost of defense and burden this puts on freight brokers. Instead of a motion to dismiss, and obtaining a dismissal at the pleading stage with very minimal cost of defense, brokers will now be required to carry the defense to summary judgment or trial in order to establish a proximate cause defense. Freight brokers should consider general liability insurance policies, hired and non-owned coverage, and umbrella policies that include not just indemnity but just as importantly: cost of defense.
