Curtis Publishes 2025 Supreme Court Global Business Review

Read the full report here.

On June 30, 2025, the Supreme Court concluded another term with landmark decisions that will reshape U.S. law for decades. Many Supreme Court decisions have a ripple effect well beyond our borders, so our lawyers monitor the Supreme Court docket for cases that may be of interest to clients with inbound or outbound operations. This year, we selected nine decisions, from cases involving foreign relations to e-commerce and employment law, because of their potential to impact international business or world affairs.

Fuld v. Palestine Liberation Organization: The federal government has broad constitutional power to hale foreign persons into U.S. courts, but that power might not be boundless. The Fifth Amendment’s Due Process Clause, which delimits the federal court’s power to exercise personal jurisdiction in most cases, does not contain the same “minimum contacts” requirement that applies in the courts of constituent states under the Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process Clause.

CC/Devas (Mauritius) Limited v. Antrix Corp.: The Court left unresolved whether foreign states and their agencies or instrumentalities are “persons” entitled to due process as a matter of constitutional law when it clarified that the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (FSIA), which applies in all civil actions against foreign states and their agencies and instrumentalities, does not require constitutional-level “minimum contacts” to establish personal jurisdiction under the statute.

Hungary v. Simon: The FSIA requires that property taken by a foreign state be traced directly to property present in the United States to establish jurisdiction over the foreign state under the FSIA’s expropriation exception to sovereign immunity. An allegation that a foreign state liquidated expropriated property, commingled the proceeds with other funds, and then used some of those commingled funds for commercial activities in the United States is insufficient.

Smith & Wesson Brands, Inc. v. Estados Unidos Mexicanos: The Court affirmed the dismissal of the Mexican government’s complaint against U.S. firearms manufacturers for their alleged role in the harmful, unlawful trafficking of firearms into Mexico, but clarified the legal standard for holding firearms manufacturers and sellers liable for aiding and abetting unlawful uses of firearms.

TikTok v. Garland: National security concerns may override the First Amendment’s free speech protections in cases involving foreign ownership of social media platforms, such as TikTok.

Free Speech Coalition Inc. v. Paxton: States may require age verification to access adult content online without infringing free speech. The law at issue was sufficiently tailored to achieve its purpose of keeping children from accessing adult content without unnecessarily restricting adults’ access to protected speech. This decision could pave the way for more intrusive regulations of online content.

Dewberry Group, Inc. v. Dewberry Engineers Inc.: Only the named defendant’s profits may be awarded to the prevailing plaintiff in a trademark infringement suit under the Lanham Act, emphasizing the importance of treating separately incorporated organizations as distinct legal entities.

Stanley v. City of Sanford: Retired employees may not invoke the protections of the American with Disabilities Act (ADA) to challenge changes to their retirement benefits, as the ADA does not protect former employees who neither hold nor desire a job at the time of an employer’s alleged discriminatory action.

Ames v. Ohio Dept. of Youth Services: Members of majority groups are not required to prove anything more than members of minority groups to establish discrimination under Title VII, the federal law that prohibits employment discrimination based on race, religion, and sex, among other characteristics.

A Word About Our Process

In preparing this year’s report, we again relied on generative AI with some changes. We asked our contributing associates to prompt Lexis Protégé to generate the first draft of each case summary. Each associate employed their own prompting techniques to test for potential variations in the quality of the outputs.

Consistent with Curtis’ internal AI policy, our contributing attorneys reviewed and revised Protégé’s outputs to ensure accuracy, appropriateness and completeness based on their independent analysis of the cases. As was the case last year, we noticed that some of the outputs were better than others, and none of them were sophisticated enough to displace human oversight.

While we continue to develop our AI capabilities for the benefit of our clients, our most valuable asset remains our professional experience and human judgment.

We disclose this process consistent with Curtis’ internal AI policy’s emphasis on transparency. Nothing in this disclosure implies Lexis’ affiliation, endorsement, or sponsorship.