SCOTUS: Mexico Cannot Sue US Gun Manufacturers

In August 2021, Mexico sued 10 US gun manufacturers arguing the companies were intentionally marketing guns to Mexico and therefore partly responsible for the wave of violence using guns in the country.

The suit accuses the companies of actively facilitating the flow of weapons to powerful drug cartels, and fueling a traffic in which 70 percent of guns traced in Mexico are found to have come from the United States.

“For decades, the government and its citizens have been victimized by a deadly flood of military-style and other particularly lethal guns that flows from the U.S. across the border,” the lawsuit reads. The flood of weaponry is “the foreseeable result of the defendants’ deliberate actions and business practices.”

The government cited as an example three guns made by Colt that appear to directly target a Mexican audience, with Spanish nicknames and themes that resonate in Mexico. One of them, a special edition .38 pistol, is engraved with the face of the Mexican revolutionary hero Emiliano Zapata and a quote that has been attributed to him: “It is better to die standing than to live on your knees.”

And because gun crime is rampant in Mexico, the country was seeking a huge payout to cover the cost of this crime.

Alejandro Celorio, legal advisor for the ministry, told reporters Wednesday that the damage caused by the trafficked guns would be equal to 1.7% to 2% of Mexico’s gross domestic product. The government will seek at least $10 billion in compensation, he said. Mexico’s GDP last year was more than $1.2 trillion.

There was one big, obvious hurdle this case had to face. Gun manufacturers are protected by a law called the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PCLAA) which says they can’t be sued for the misuse of their product. And sure enough, a lower court dismissed the case in 2022 on the basis of that law. However, Mexico appealed and the case was revived by a US appeals court in January 2024.

On Monday, a US appeals court ruled that the Mexican lawsuit “plausibly alleges a type of claim that is statutorily exempt” from the PCLAA, which only covers lawful gun sales…

In a statement, Jon Lowy, the president of Global Action on Gun Violence – who serves as Mexico’s co-counsel on the case – said that the ruling is a “huge step forward in holding the gun industry accountable for its contribution to gun violence, and in stopping the flood of trafficked guns to the cartels.”

That decision was appealed in April 2024 by Smith and Wesson.

In a filing to the justices, the manufacturer wrote that “Mexico’s suit has no business in an American court,” and that the country’s argument was an “eight-step Rube Goldberg, starting with the lawful production and sale of firearms in the United States and ending with the harms that drug cartels inflict on the Mexican government.”…

When criminals improperly use a product, including guns, they are typically responsible for their own actions, the company said in a different filing to the court. “If the rule were otherwise, every industry — from beer to cars to knives — would be on the hook for the predictable misuse of its product,” lawyers for the gun maker wrote.

Today we got a unanimous ruling from the Supreme Court saying Mexico cannot sue because PCLAA protects them.

In a unanimous decision by Justice Elena Kagan, the court held that a lawsuit by the Mexican government was barred by U.S. legislation that insulates gun makers from liability. Mexico, she wrote, had not plausibly argued that American gun manufacturers had aided and abetted in unlawful gun sales to Mexican drug traffickers…

During an oral argument in early March, a majority of the justices appeared skeptical that Mexico could prove a direct link between gunmakers and cartel violence. Several justices appeared persuaded that a 2005 law shielding gun makers and distributors from most domestic lawsuits over injuries caused by firearms could also apply to the case brought by the Mexican government…

At the March oral argument, Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh had appeared receptive to those concerns. He asked about the broader implications if Mexico succeeded in arguing that manufacturers acting lawfully could be held responsible for illegal behavior by cartels, an outcome that he worried could have “destructive effects on the American economy.”

The whole decision isn’t very long but this bit sort of sums up the reasoning by comparing this case to two previous cases involving corporate liability.

Two of our cases—one approving liability for aiding another’s crime, the other not—illustrate how all this doctrine plays out in practice. In Direct Sales Co. v. United States (1943), we held that a mail-order pharmacy could be convicted for assisting a small-town doctor’s illegal distribution of narcotics. The pharmacy, Direct Sales, sold huge amounts of morphine to Dr. John Tate: Whereas the average physician required no more than 400 quarter-grain tablets annually, Direct Sales sold Tate some 5,000 to 6,000 half-grain tablets every month. Still more, Direct Sales “actively stimulated” Tate’s purchases, by giving him special discounts for his most massive orders and using “high-pressure sales methods.” And it did all that against the backdrop of law enforcement warnings: The Bureau of Narcotics had informed Direct Sales that “it was being used as a source of supply” by lawbreaking doctors. All that evidence, this Court found, … showed that Direct Sales “not only kn[ew of] and acquiesce[d]” in Tate’s “illicit enterprise,” but “join[ed] both mind and hand with him to make its accomplishment possible.”

By contrast, this Court recently ordered the dismissal of a suit against several social-media companies for aiding and abetting a terrorist attack carried out by ISIS. See Twitter v. Taamneh (2023). The plaintiffs, victims of the attack, alleged that adherents of ISIS used the companies’ platforms for recruiting and fundraising. The complaint further asserted that the companies knew that was so, yet failed to identify and remove the ISIS-related accounts and content. But we held that was not enough to make the companies liable for ISIS’s terrorist acts. The companies’ relationship with ISIS and its supporters, we reasoned, was “the same as their relationship with their billion-plus other users: arm’s length, passive, and largely indifferent.” There were no allegations that the companies had given ISIS “any special treatment,” or “encourag[ed], solicit[ed], or advis[ed]” the group. Instead, after providing their platforms for general use, the companies “at most allegedly stood back and watched.” More was needed, we stated, for a provider of generally available goods or services to be liable for a customer’s misuse of them—for example, conduct of the kind in Direct Sales. When a company merely knows that “some bad actors” are taking “advantage” of its products for criminal purposes, it does not aid and abet. And that is so even if the company could adopt measures to reduce their users’ downstream crimes….

Viewed against the backdrop of that law, Mexico’s complaint does not plausibly allege that the defendant manufacturers aided and abetted gun dealers’ unlawful sales of firearms to Mexican traffickers. We have little doubt that, as the complaint asserts, some such sales take place—and that the manufacturers know they do. But still, Mexico has not adequately pleaded what it needs to: that the manufacturers “participate in” those sales “as in something that [they] wish[] to bring about,” and “seek by [their] action to make” succeed.

Bottom line: Aiding and abetting means more than being vaguely aware of something.

What I’m not seeing so far is the wailing and gnashing of teeth from gun control groups that I would expect. Maybe they are still on a conference call working out their response. Meanwhile, pro-2nd Amendment groups are celebrating.

BREAKING:

SCOTUS rules unanimously in favor of Smith & Wesson against Mexico.

A thinly veiled attempt to shut down the second amendment, obliterate the firearm manufacturing industry, and impose European style gun control via judicial fiat.

“Held: Because Mexico’s complaint… pic.twitter.com/kq1Onux1aw

— National Association for Gun Rights (@NatlGunRights) June 5, 2025