Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/22pdf/21-468_5if6.pdf
Page Number: 49.0

Cite as:  598 U. S. ____ (2023) 

9 

Opinion of ROBERTS, C. J. 

interstate  firms,”  ibid.—such  that  they  constitute  a  sub-
stantial burden under  Pike.  At the very least, the harms 
alleged  by  petitioners  are  categorically  different  from  the 
cost of installing $30 mudguards, Bibb, 359 U. S., at 525, or 
of constructing a $200,000 cantaloupe packing facility, Pike, 
397 U. S., at 140. 

JUSTICE  GORSUCH  asks  what  separates  my  approach 
from the per se extraterritoriality rule I reject.  Ante, at 25.  
It  is  the  difference  between  mere  cross-border  effects  and 
broad  impact  requiring,  in  this  case,  compliance  even  by
producers who do not wish to sell in the regulated market. 
And even then, we only invalidate a regulation if that bur-
den proves “clearly excessive in relation to the putative lo-
cal benefits.”  Pike, 397 U. S., at 142.  Adhering to that es-
tablished  approach  in  this  case  would  not  convert  the 
inquiry  into  a  per se  rule  against  extraterritorial  regula-
tion. 

Rather than analyze petitioners’ alleged harms to the in-
terstate market on their own terms, the Ninth Circuit rea-
soned that the “crux” of the complaint is “the cost of compli-
ance  with  Proposition  12.”  6  F. 4th,  at  1033.    Such  “cost 
increases,” the panel below concluded, “do not qualify as a
substantial  burden  to  interstate  commerce.”    Ibid.  Those 
statements  ignore  the  industry-wide  harms  discussed 
above. 

The panel below itself recognized that petitioners “plau-
sibly  alleged  that  Proposition  12  will  have  dramatic  up-
stream  effects  and  require  pervasive  changes  to  the  pork
production industry nationwide.”  Ibid.  Yet it nevertheless 
reduced the myriad harms detailed by petitioners in their 
complaint  to  so-called  “compliance  costs”  and  wrote  them
off as independently insufficient to state a claim under Pike. 
Our precedents do not support such an approach.  A major-
ity  of  the  Court  agrees  that—were  it  possible  to  balance 
benefits  and  burdens  in  this  context—petitioners  have 
plausibly  stated  a  substantial  burden  against  interstate