The Supreme Court Didn’t Just Rule on Glyphosate — It Reasserted Who Gets to Decide What Science Means
The Supreme Court Didn’t Just Rule on Glyphosate — It Reasserted Who Gets to Decide What Science Means AGRIREG.CA By someone who has spent a career in pesticide regulation — and who still remembers a weed‑science professor casually saying he could drink a glass of Roundup to prove a point about toxicology. The U.S. Supreme Court’s June 25 decision in Monsanto Co. v. Durnell is more than a legal victory for Bayer. It is a blunt reminder that in a country where scientific debates routinely spill into courtrooms, there must be a boundary between federal regulatory science and state‑level jury speculation. By ruling that FIFRA preempts state failure‑to‑warn claims, the Court effectively shut down the central engine of Roundup litigation: the argument that Monsanto should have warned consumers about cancer risk even though EPA — after decades of review — never required such a warning. This is not a small procedural tweak. It is a structural correction. The Court Reaffirmed a Principl...