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Page Number: 25

12 

THOLE v. U. S. BANK N. A. 

SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting 

to “[r]espon[d] to deficiencies in prior law regulating [retire-
ment] plan fiduciaries” and to provide even greater protec-
tions  for  defined-benefit-plan  beneficiaries,  Harris  Trust, 
530 U. S., at 241–242; see also Spokeo, 578 U. S., at ___ (slip 
op., at 9) (historical and congressionally recognized injuries 
often support standing). 

Given all that history and ERISA’s text, this Court itself
has noted, in the defined-benefit-plan context, “that when a
trustee” breaches “his fiduciary duty to the beneficiaries,” 
the “beneficiaries may then maintain an action for restitu-
tion . . . or disgorgement.”  Harris Trust, 530 U. S., at 250. 
Harris Trust confirms that ERISA incorporated “[t]he com-
mon law of trusts” to allow defined-benefit-plan beneficiar-
ies to seek relief from fiduciary breaches.  Ibid.; see also id., 
at 241–242 (noting that certain ERISA provisions “supple-
men[t] the fiduciary’s general duty of loyalty to the plan’s 
beneficiaries”).5 

2 
The Court offers no reply to all the historical and statu-
tory evidence showing petitioners’ concrete interest in pru-
dent and loyal fiduciaries.

Instead,  the  Court  insists  again  that  “participants  in  a
defined-benefit plan are not similarly situated to the bene-
ficiaries of a private trust,” ante,  at 4, and that the “com-
plaint did not plausibly and clearly claim that the alleged
mismanagement  of  the  plan  substantially  increased  the 

—————— 

5 Curiously,  today’s  Court  suggests  that  ERISA’s  efforts  to  bolster 
trust-law fiduciary duties actually degraded them instead.  See ante, at 
4 (justifying a narrow construction of ERISA protections because “trust 
law informs but does not control interpretation of ERISA”).  Yet the case 
the Court cites, Varity Corp. v. Howe, 516 U. S. 489 (1996), relied on trust 
law to establish the minimum obligations ERISA imposes on plan fidu-
ciaries.  See id., at 506 (confirming that the “ERISA fiduciary duty in-
cludes [the] common law duty of loyalty”).  Today’s Court mistakes the 
floor for the ceiling.  See ibid.; see also Harris Trust, 530 U. S., at 241– 
242.