Broker liability · Court decisions

What the Montgomery Decision Means for Freight Brokers

Montgomery v. Caribe Transport II, LLC, No. 24-1238 · Decided May 14, 2026 · By the CarrierBasis team · Published Aug 2, 2026 · Not legal advice

On May 14, 2026, a unanimous Supreme Court held in Montgomery v. Caribe Transport II, LLC that federal law does not shield freight brokers from state-law claims that they negligently selected an unsafe motor carrier. Justice Barrett wrote for the Court; Justice Kavanaugh concurred, joined by Justice Alito. The decision resolved a long-running circuit split and removed a defense many brokers had relied on to end these cases before discovery.

This article summarizes what the Court decided, what it deliberately did not decide, and what the ruling means practically for how brokers select and document carriers. It is an informational summary, not legal advice.

The case

Shawn Montgomery had pulled his tractor-trailer onto the shoulder of an Illinois highway when a truck operated by Caribe Transport II veered off course and struck him, causing catastrophic injuries. C.H. Robinson had arranged the shipment as the broker. Montgomery alleged that the carrier held a Conditional safety rating and had documented deficiencies involving driver qualifications, hours-of-service compliance, inspection and maintenance, and its recordable crash rate — and that Robinson knew or should have known that selecting the carrier was unreasonably dangerous.

The district court dismissed the claim as preempted by the Federal Aviation Administration Authorization Act (FAAAA), following the Seventh Circuit's 2023 decision in Ye v. GlobalTranz, and the Seventh Circuit affirmed. Other circuits had gone the other way — the Sixth and Ninth had allowed similar claims to proceed — and the Supreme Court took the case to resolve the split.

What the Court held

The FAAAA generally preempts state laws related to a broker's prices, routes, or services, but it contains a safety exception: it does not restrict a state's safety regulatory authority "with respect to motor vehicles" (49 U.S.C. §14501(c)(2)(A)). The Court held that a negligent-hiring claim against a broker falls within that exception. Requiring whoever selects a carrier to exercise ordinary care in that selection directly concerns the motor vehicles that end up on the highway as a result.

What the Court did not decide

Reading more into the opinion than it holds is the most common mistake in the commentary. The Court did not:

• Find C.H. Robinson negligent. The case was remanded for further proceedings. Whether the selection actually breached a duty of care is for the courts below.
• Create a federal vetting standard. There is no court-issued checklist, no mandated set of data sources, and no prescribed refresh interval. The applicable duty comes from state negligence law, and reasonableness is decided case by case.
• Eliminate preemption generally. State-law claims tied to prices, routes, and services that are unrelated to safety remain preempted. It is the safety-related selection claim that survives.

What actually changed

Before Montgomery, a broker in several circuits could often win dismissal on preemption without the selection process ever being examined. That off-ramp is gone. The change is procedural, but its consequences are practical: a broker's carrier-selection process can now be examined under state negligence law — in discovery, in depositions, sometimes years after the load delivered.

The questions that examination asks are predictable, because they appear throughout the allegations and rulings in these cases: What did you check? How current was the information? What safety concerns were visible? How did you evaluate them? Why was this carrier appropriate for this load? Can you show what happened at the time of selection?

It is also worth noting the concurrence: Justice Kavanaugh's discussion referenced 3PLs, freight forwarders, and digital freight platforms — a signal that the logic reaches anyone in the supply chain who selects carriers, not only entities labeled "brokers."

What brokers should consider doing now

Nothing in the opinion prescribes a process. But the shape of a defensible one is visible in what these cases examine:

• Adopt a written carrier-selection policy — what you check, what disqualifies, what requires review — and apply it consistently.
• Make the information current at decision time. A carrier vetted at onboarding months ago may look very different by the load date. See how often brokers should recheck a carrier.
• Review concerns on the record. An isolated concern, examined in context and resolved with a documented reason, is a very different fact in litigation than a concern nobody looked at.
• Preserve the decision, per load. The examination is about a specific shipment. A load-specific record of what was checked, what was found, and why the carrier was approved — created at commitment and preserved unaltered — is what answers the questions above. See what brokers should check before every load.
• Talk to your insurance broker and counsel. Coverage for negligent-selection tort exposure, and the specifics of your state's negligence law, are questions for professionals — not for software vendors or articles like this one.

Sources

• Opinion of the Court (PDF), Montgomery v. Caribe Transport II, LLC, No. 24-1238 (May 14, 2026) — supremecourt.gov
• Case docket and history — SCOTUSblog (reversed and remanded, 9-0; Barrett, J.; Kavanaugh, J., concurring, joined by Alito, J.)
• Full opinion and syllabus — Justia
• Oral argument transcript (PDF), argued March 4, 2026 — supremecourt.gov
• Lower court: Ye v. GlobalTranz Enterprises, Inc., 74 F.4th 453 (7th Cir. 2023), applied by the district court; affirmed at 124 F.4th 1053 (7th Cir.) before reversal.

Factual details of the allegations are drawn from the Court's opinion and syllabus. This article summarizes the decision and has not been reviewed by counsel.