States Reject Bayer’s Roundup Legal Immunity Campaign

Pushback of the Week, June 22, 2025

States Reject Bayer’s Roundup Legal Immunity Campaign

In 2018, chemical giant Bayer acquired Monsanto, manufacturer of the infamous glyphosate-containing pesticide Roundup. In light of the tsunami of lawsuits against Monsanto alleging that the company failed to warn users about cancer risks, many observers scratched their heads at the acquisition and wondered if there was a deeper end game.

By May 2025, Bayer was definitely feeling the squeeze, having paid out $11 billion in settlements for roughly 100,000 Roundup lawsuits, with another 67,000 cases wending their way through state courts. With recent jury verdicts ranging from $175 million to $2.25 billion, there is “no indication,” says one law firm, “that jurors are growing more sympathetic to the defense.” Meanwhile, a new animal study published out of Italy in June reported that glyphosate causes multiple types of cancer at doses at or below current European Union safety limits.

Whether Bayer envisioned working toward legal carte blanche at the time it acquired Monsanto will probably never be known, but since 2024, its strategy has been just that—to aggressively lobby state legislators to negate the risk of lawsuits by granting the company a legal liability shield comparable to the federal 1986 Act that exempted pharmaceutical companies from liability for vaccines.

Thus far, Bayer has managed to buy off North Dakota, Georgia, and probably North Carolina—and it is also venturing a gambit in the Supreme Court—but as ZeroHedge recently reported, the chemical company’s “heavy-handed tactics have sparked fierce resistance” in the heartland, including, ironically, in the Monsanto headquarters state of Missouri. Reflecting rare bipartisan consensus, 24 Republicans and 48 Democrats in the Missouri state House rejected a Bayer-friendly bill.

As ZeroHedge reminds us,

“[T]he only way to hold a company like Monsanto-Bayer accountable for not properly warning consumers, is through state-based constitutional law.”

We congratulate Missouri’s legislators—as well as legislators in states like Iowa, Florida, Tennessee, and Idaho—for braving the Bayer war chest to send a message that state-based constitutional law still matters.

Track bills in your state here.