Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/20pdf/20-297_4g25.pdf
Page Number: 49.0

18 

TRANSUNION LLC v. RAMIREZ 

THOMAS, J., dissenting 

case have come out differently? 

And if some of these examples do cause sufficiently “con-
crete” and “real”—though “intangible”—harms, how do we 
go about picking and choosing which ones do and which do 
not?  I  see  no  way  to  engage  in  this  “inescapably  value-
laden”  inquiry  without  it  “devolv[ing]  into  [pure]  policy 
judgment.”  Sierra, 996 F. 3d, at 1129 (Newsom, J., concur-
ring).  Weighing  the  harms  caused  by  specific  facts  and 
choosing  remedies  seems  to  me  like  a  much  better  fit  for
legislatures and juries than for this Court. 

Finally,  it  is  not  just  the  harm  that  is  reminiscent  of  a
constitutional  case  or  controversy.    So  too  is  the  remedy. 
Although statutory damages are not necessarily a proxy for 
unjust enrichment, they have a similar flavor in this case. 
TransUnion  violated  consumers’  rights  in  order  to  create
and sell a product to its clients.  Reckless handling of con-
sumer  information  and  bungled  responses  to  requests  for 
information  served  a  means  to  an  end.    And  the  end  was 
financial gain.  “TransUnion could not confirm that a single
OFAC alert sold to its customers was accurate.” 951 F. 3d, 
at 1021, n. 4.  Yet thanks to this Court, it may well be in a
position to keep much of its ill-gotten gains. 9 

* 
Ultimately,  the  majority  seems  to  pose  to  the  reader  a 

* 

* 

—————— 

9 Today’s decision might actually be a pyrrhic victory for TransUnion. 
The Court does not prohibit Congress from creating statutory rights for 
consumers; it simply holds that federal courts lack jurisdiction to hear 
some of these  cases.  That combination may leave state courts—which 
“are not bound by the limitations of a case or controversy or other federal 
rules  of  justiciability  even  when  they  address  issues  of  federal  law,” 
ASARCO Inc. v. Kadish, 490 U. S. 605, 617 (1989)—as the sole forum for 
such cases, with defendants unable to seek removal to federal court.  See 
also  Bennett,  The  Paradox  of  Exclusive  State-Court  Jurisdiction  Over 
Federal Claims, 105 Minn. L. Rev. 1211 (2021).  By declaring that federal 
courts lack jurisdiction, the Court has thus ensured that state courts will 
exercise exclusive jurisdiction over these sorts of class actions.