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AXON ENTERPRISE, INC. v. FTC 

Syllabus 

review scheme specified in the Securities Exchange Act—“administra-
tive review followed by judicial review in a federal court of appeals”— 
“implicitly divest[s] district courts of jurisdiction” over “challenges to 
SEC proceedings,” including Cochran’s constitutional ones.  Likewise, 
the district court in Axon’s case found that the FTC Act’s comparable 
review scheme displaces §1331 jurisdiction for claims concerning the 
FTC’s adjudications.  On appeal, the Ninth Circuit affirmed the  dis-
trict court’s dismissal of Axon’s constitutional challenges to the FTC 
proceeding, concluding that the claims were the type that fell within 
the FTC Act’s review scheme.  But the en banc Fifth Circuit disagreed 
as to the equivalent SEC question, finding that Cochran’s claim would 
not receive “meaningful judicial review” in a court of appeals; that the 
claim  was  “wholly  collateral  to  the  Exchange  Act’s  statutory-review 
scheme”; and that the claim fell “outside the SEC’s expertise.” 

Held: The statutory review schemes set out in the Securities Exchange 
Act  and  Federal  Trade  Commission  Act  do  not  displace  a  district 
court’s federal-question jurisdiction over claims challenging as uncon-
stitutional the structure or existence of the SEC or FTC.  Pp. 7–18. 

(a) Although  district  courts  may  ordinarily  hear  challenges  to  fed-
eral  agency  actions  by  way of  §1331’s  jurisdictional  grant  for  claims 
“arising  under”  federal  law,  Congress  may  substitute  an  alternative 
review scheme.  In both the Exchange Act and the FTC Act, Congress 
did so: It provided for review of claims about agency action in a court 
of appeals following the agency’s own review process.  The creation of 
such a review scheme divests district courts of their ordinary jurisdic-
tion over covered cases.  But the statutory scheme does not necessarily 
extend to every claim concerning agency action.  See, e.g., Thunder Ba-
sin Coal Co. v. Reich, 510 U. S. 200, 207–213.  This Court has identi-
fied three considerations—commonly known as the Thunder Basin fac-
tors—to  determine  whether  particular  claims  concerning  agency 
action are “of the type Congress intended to be reviewed within th[e] 
statutory structure.”  Id., at 212.  First, could precluding district court 
jurisdiction “foreclose all meaningful judicial review” of the claim?  Id., 
at 212–213.  Next, is the claim “wholly collateral” to the statute’s re-
view provisions?  Id, at 212.  And last, is the claim “outside the agency’s 
expertise”?  Ibid. 

The Court has twice held specific claims to fit within a statutory re-
view scheme, based on the Thunder Basin factors.  In Thunder Basin 
itself, a coal company subject to the Mine Act filed suit in district court 
instead  of  asserting  its  claims—as  a  statutory  scheme  prescribed— 
first before a mine safety commission and then (if needed) a court of 
appeals.  The crux of the dispute concerned the company’s refusal to 
provide employee-designated union officials with access to the work-
place in accordance with the Mine Act.  The company also objected on