Concrete And Particularized Part III: Initial Circuit Court Reactions To Spokeo

In the two months since the U.S. Supreme Court issued its much-awaited decision in Robins v. Spokeo, 136 S. Ct. 1540 (2016), a handful of federal circuits have applied the decision to pending disputes over Article III standing. Consistent with the scope of the Court's holding, described in Parts I and II of our coverage of the decision, the circuits have varied in their treatment of Spokeo. This post provides a brief rundown of the decisions thus far, which take three basic forms.

First, and least significant, two circuits have only briefly cited Spokeo without giving any hint of how they will apply Spokeo. See Texas v. EEOC, — F.3d —, No. 14-10949, 2016 WL 3524242, at *13 (5th Cir. June 27, 2016) (citing Spokeo only for the basic elements of standing); Pierce v. Green Tree Servicing LLC, — F. App'x. —, No. 15-1473, 2016 WL 3435391, at *1 (10th Cir. June 21, 2016) (citing Spokeo for definition of "injury in fact").