What did the Supreme Court hold in Montgomery v. Caribe Transport II?

The Court held unanimously that the FAAAA does not preempt a state-law negligent-hiring claim against a freight broker. Requiring a broker to use ordinary care in selecting a motor carrier "concerns" motor vehicles, so the claim falls within the safety exception at 49 U.S.C. 14501(c)(2)(A) and is saved from the preemption clause at 14501(c)(1).

When was Montgomery v. Caribe Transport II decided?

May 14, 2026. The case is No. 24-1238, reported at 608 U.S. ___ (2026). The decision was unanimous.

Does Montgomery mean a broker is automatically liable for a carrier crash?

No. It removes a threshold defense, not the plaintiff’s burden. The broker no longer gets the claim dismissed on preemption grounds, so the case proceeds to the merits — whether the broker exercised ordinary care in selecting that carrier. That is decided on the facts of the selection.

Which states does Montgomery apply in?

All fifty. Preemption is a question of federal law, so the decision removes the same defense everywhere at once, regardless of which state’s negligence law governs the underlying claim.

What was wrong with the carrier in Montgomery?

The plaintiff alleged the carrier held a conditional FMCSA safety rating with documented deficiencies in driver qualification, hours-of-service compliance, vehicle maintenance and crash rate — and that the broker selected it anyway.

Montgomery v. Caribe Transport II: What the Supreme Court Held and What Brokers Must Do

On May 14, 2026, a unanimous Supreme Court held in Montgomery v. Caribe Transport II, LLC that the FAAAA does not preempt a state-law negligent-hiring claim against a freight broker. Requiring a broker to use ordinary care in selecting a carrier "concerns" motor vehicles, so the claim falls inside the statute's safety exception and survives. The practical effect: the preemption defense that ended these cases early is gone in all fifty states, and carrier selection is now decided on its facts — in front of a jury.

Montgomery v. Caribe Transport II, LLC, No. 24-1238, 608 U.S. ___ (2026), decided May 14, 2026 (unanimous).

The facts

Shawn Montgomery was stopped on the side of a road in Illinois when he was struck by a truck and seriously injured. He sued three parties: the driver, the motor carrier Caribe Transport II, LLC, and the freight broker that arranged the shipment, C.H. Robinson.

The claim against the broker was negligent selection. Montgomery alleged that Caribe held a conditional FMCSA safety rating, with documented deficiencies across driver qualification, hours of service, vehicle maintenance and crash rate — and that the broker tendered the load to it regardless.

The legal question

Two provisions of the FAAAA were in tension.

§ 14501(c)(1) — the preemption clause. States may not enforce a law "related to a price, route, or service" of a motor carrier or broker "with respect to the transportation of property." Brokers had used this for over a decade to argue that a negligent-selection claim regulates their service of choosing carriers, and is therefore preempted.
§ 14501(c)(2)(A) — the safety exception. That preemption "shall not restrict the safety regulatory authority of a State with respect to motor vehicles."

The circuits had split on whether a common-law negligence claim counts as an exercise of a state's "safety regulatory authority," and whether a claim against a broker is one "with respect to motor vehicles" when the broker owns no trucks.

What the Court decided

Requiring a broker to exercise ordinary care in selecting a carrier concerns motor vehicles — most obviously, the trucks that will carry the goods. The claim therefore falls within the safety exception, which saves it from preemption.

The reasoning is narrower than the headlines suggest, and the narrowness matters. The Court did not create a new duty, did not decide that C.H. Robinson was negligent, and did not rule on what reasonable care requires. It answered one question — whether the courthouse door is open — and answered yes.

What actually changed

Before Montgomery	After Montgomery
Preemption often ended the case on a motion, before discovery.	The claim proceeds to the merits of the selection decision.
Exposure varied by circuit; forum mattered enormously.	The defense is gone uniformly, in all fifty states.
Having a process was largely sufficient.	Producing the decision is what matters.
Vetting was an operations cost.	Vetting is an evidentiary asset — or an evidentiary hole.

The shift is evidentiary, not procedural. Because the case now reaches the merits, the question in the room becomes what you knew at the moment of tender, who weighed it, and what they concluded. A process you cannot produce reads to a jury as no process at all.

Most brokers have dashboards, browser tabs, emails and memories. None of those is a contemporaneous record.

What a defensible selection looks like now

Four elements. A gap in any one is the gap a plaintiff's expert builds the case around.

1 · Identity verifiedThe carrier is who it claims to be — not a reincarnation of a revoked authority operating under a fresh MC number.

2 · Risk assessedAuthority, insurance and safety signals weighed on the record — with the reasoning preserved, not just the conclusion.

3 · Decision documentedA named reviewer reached a decision at a fixed time, including any override of a flag, and that record is tamper-evident.

4 · Monitoring maintainedMaterial changes after tender were tracked and appended — the file is current, not frozen at onboarding.

Who is exposed

Freight brokers and 3PLs — the direct defendants.
Shippers who select or approve carriers themselves — the same theory reaches them, because the duty attaches to the act of selection, not the job title.
Freight forwarders, NVOCCs and customs brokers performing brokerage functions.
Insurers and MGAs writing freight-broker liability or contingent auto — the claim lands on the policy.

Bring the record to your desk.

A 20-minute scoping call — no cost, no commitment. Bring your current carrier-selection process and we will show you what it produces at claim time.

See if we can help

What negligent carrier selection meansThe elements of the claim, and what actually defends it.Carrier selection policyThe written SOP underwriters now ask to see.What it means for your coverageWhy a contingent-auto-only program may not respond.

Montgomery v. Caribe Transport II, explained