As we know, injured plaintiffs in highway accident lawsuits (and beyond) often look for other sources of financial recovery than the trucking company involved in the accident. Typically, multiple defendants are named, including the truck driver, trucking company, broker, shipper, truck dealer and truck manufacturer. Specifically, plaintiffs often seek recovery from freight brokers under the theory that the broker should have known that the trucking company it selected was unsafe. Some federal courts in the past have ruled that such claims against brokers for “negligent hiring or selection” of a motor carrier are preempted by federal law.  However, last Thursday, the United States Supreme Court issued a unanimous 9-0 decision in Montgomery v. Caribe Transport, II, LLC, No. 24-1238, slip op. (U.S. May 14, 2026), permitting state law negligent hiring and selection claims against transportation brokers.  

In Montgomery, the driver of a tractor trailer owned by Caribe Transport veered off the road while transporting a load of plastic pots, and collided with the tractor trailer of Shawn Montgomery, who had stopped on the side of the road. C.H. Robinson World-Wide, Inc., the broker, coordinated the shipment. After the collision, Montgomery faced severe and life-altering injuries, including an amputated leg.

In the litigation that followed, the parties did not dispute that state tort claims against trucking companies are not preempted, that claims against shippers are not preempted, or that the FAAAA preempts state-law claims against brokers for arranging intrastate transportation.

Instead, the question presented in Montgomery was whether state tort claims against brokers who select the trucking companies are preempted by federal law. The Supremacy Clause of the United States Constitution invalidates state laws that are contrary to federal law through a process known as preemption.

The validity of Montgomery’s claim against C.H. Robinson turned on the language of the Federal Aviation Administration Authorization Act (FAAAA), a federal law that Congress passed as a part of the deregulation of the airline and trucking industries. The FAAAA has a broad preemption provision that had previously served as a first line of defense against claims against transportation brokers arising from trucking accidents. See 49 U.S.C. § 14501(c).

Section (c)(1) of the statute expressly preempts all state “law[s], regulation[s], or other provision[s] having the force and effect of law related to a price, route, or service” of any motor carrier or broker “with respect to the transportation of property.” However, section (c)(2)(A) contains a safety exception to preemption, stating that the preemption provision “shall not restrict the safety regulatory authority of a state with respect to motor vehicles.” 

The Supreme Court unanimously concluded that state law tort claims against transportation brokers based upon the negligent selection of motor carriers fall within the safety exception of the provision and thus are saved from preemption. This decision is important because it resolved a circuit split among the lower courts and overruled other lower federal court decisions, like the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals’ decision in Ye v. GlobalTranz Enterprises, Inc., 74 F.4th 453 (7th Cir. 2023), that such state law claims were preempted by the FAAAA. The decision also overturns the decision of the Eleventh Circuit in Aspen Am. Ins. Co. v. Landstar Ranger, Inc., 65 F.4th 1261 (11th Cir. 2023), which reached the same result. In short, the Supreme Court’s ruling in Montgomery eliminates freight brokers’ first line of defense in state tort claims concerning motor vehicle safety.

What This Means Moving Forward

The Supreme Court’s decision will have an immediate impact upon lawsuits currently pending and several that have been stayed awaiting a ruling on this preemption issue. For example, just days after the Supreme Court issued its ruling, the Fourth Circuit revived a South Carolina widow’s lawsuit against a broker for negligently selecting the trucking company involved in the 2022 accident that killed her husband. The Fourth Circuit vacated its prior ruling granting summary judgment in the broker’s favor. 

But not all hope is lost. The Court was careful to say the safety exception “saves only a subset of preempted claims: those involving regulations concerning motor vehicle safety.” State-law theories that do not concern motor vehicle safety — claims targeting how a broker priced a shipment, which routes it dispatched, or other purely economic conduct — remain preempted. Likewise, the defense of preemption is still available for traditional cargo loss, damage, or delay claims.

Ultimately, prospective plaintiffs still must prove (1) the broker’s actions failed to meet a reasonable standard of care; and (2) the broker's selection of a particular carrier was the proximate cause of the injuries complained of. In his concurring opinion, Justice Kavanagh emphasized that “brokers should be able to successfully defend against state tort suits if the brokers have acted reasonably and arranged transportation with reputable trucking companies.” Justice Kavanaugh noted that brokers “just have to hire carriers that actually have a reasonable policy,” and that “the broker is not going to have a problem if it's asking the hard questions of the carrier.”

Practically, this all points to a few concrete steps:

1. Brokers should be checking the publicly available federal safety data on every carrier they hire. That data comes in two forms: the FMCSA’s formal safety rating (Satisfactory, Conditional, Unsatisfactory, or Unrated — assigned only after an on-site compliance review) and the BASIC percentile scores from the Safety Measurement System. Both were in play in Montgomery: Caribe Transport had a “Conditional” safety rating, and the deficiencies the Court flagged — driver qualification, hours of service, maintenance, crash rate — map directly onto BASIC categories. All of it was available to any broker with a DOT number at the time of hire. Hiring a carrier with a Conditional or Unsatisfactory rating, or one with multiple BASICs above FMCSA intervention thresholds, without further inquiry can now be used to show a documented failure to exercise reasonable care.
2. Brokers should build (or re-visit) a written vetting process — questionnaires for new carriers, periodic re-vetting of existing ones, documentation of insurance verification, and a contemporaneous record of why each carrier was selected. Brokers also need to ensure that trucking companies have adequate testing programs for drivers.
3. Brokers should expect to revisit their own insurance and contracts with motor carriers to ensure adequate risk-transfer. Even though the FAAAA does not require brokers to carry liability coverage for negligent hiring exposure, the practical reality after Montgomery is that going bare is no longer a viable posture. Companies should talk to their insurers and counsel now rather than after the first demand letter arrives.