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Cyan v. Beaver County Employees Retirement Fund

This case presented the question whether a provision of the Securities Litigation Uniform Standards Act of 1998 (SLUSA) eliminated state courts’ longstanding concurrent jurisdiction over class actions that raise only claims under the Securities Act of 1933. In a petition-stage amicus curiae brief, the government argued that, although SLUSA did not make such a change, other provisions of the statute eliminated the so-called “removal bar” that had previously prohibited defendants from removing such cases from state to federal court. At the merits stage, Public Citizen filed an amicus brief arguing that the statute allowed removal only of class actions containing certain state-law claims, not those that only included claims under the 1933 Act. In a unanimous decision issued on March 20, 2018, the Court agreed, holding that SLUSA does not strip state courts of their longstanding jurisdiction to adjudicate class actions brought under the 1933 Act.