The proposed settlement in the federal lawsuit was disclosed on Wednesday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Minnesota.

Lawyers for the plaintiffs — grocery stores, food distributors and other businesses that bought beef products directly from Tyson — said in the filing that they are working on a final settlement agreement to present to a judge for approval.

Tyson, and the attorneys for the beef purchasers did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The buyers had accused Tyson and several other major beef producers of conspiring to charge inflated prices for retail sale-ready consumer cuts or edible boxed beef between 2015 and 2022.

The plaintiffs include Pennsylvania-based Redner’s Markets and Mississippi-based R&D Marketing.

Lawyers for the plaintiffs estimated thousands of so-called direct purchasers are part of the proposed class.

The Tyson accord is the second for the direct purchasers, after JBS USA agreed to pay $52.5 million. The company denied any wrongdoing in agreeing to the deal, which was approved by a judge in 2022.

Tyson and JBS are the two largest defendants. Two remaining defendants, Cargill and National Beef, did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Arkansas-based Tyson, the largest U.S. meat company, settled related price-fixing claims from consumers in the beef litigation for $55 million.

Tyson also separately agreed this year to pay $85 million to settle a proposed consumer class-action accusing it of conspiring with rivals to inflate pork prices.

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The preliminary class action settlements were filed on Monday in federal court in Minnesota and require a judge’s approval.

Tyson, the largest U.S. meat company, will pay $55 million. Cargill agreed to pay $32.5 million. The proposed accords are the first for consumers in the price-fixing litigation, which began in 2019.

Attorneys for the plaintiffs have estimated there are about 36 million potential class members in 26 states and the District of Columbia.

Tyson, based in Arkansas, and Minnesota-based Cargill agreed to cooperate with the consumers as they pursue price-fixing claims against the remaining defendants, JBS USA and National Beef Packing.

Tyson and Cargill did not immediately respond to requests for comment, and neither did JBS and National Beef. The defendants have all denied any wrongdoing.

Lead attorneys for the consumers on Monday declined to comment.

Eligible class members are individuals who indirectly purchased beef products — such as chuck, loin and ribs — between August 2014 and December 2019 from stores such as Walmart and Costco. The retailers are not named as defendants.

An expert for the plaintiffs said he estimates total damages to the consumer class at $1.9 billion.

The plaintiffs’ lawyers said they have spent tens of thousands of hours pursuing the lawsuit. They said they will ask the court to award them up to 33.3 per cent of the settlement, or $29 million, in legal fees.

Tyson last week agreed to pay $85 million to settle a lawsuit by consumers who accused it of conspiring with rivals to inflate pork prices. Tyson denied wrongdoing in that case.

Earlier this year, JBS reached a $83.5 million settlement resolving price-fixing claims from ranchers and other plaintiffs, but not consumers. JBS has denied any wrongdoing.

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U.S. District Judge Iain Johnston in the federal court in Rockford, Illinois on Monday ruled for now to reject Deere’s effort to end the lawsuit, which was filed at the end of Democratic President Joe Biden’s administration in January.

The lawsuit alleges Deere is violating federal antitrust law by controlling too tightly where and how farmers can get their equipment repaired, allowing the Illinois-based company to charge artificially higher prices. The FTC was joined in its lawsuit by Michigan, Wisconsin and three other U.S. states.

Deere did not immediately respond to a request for comment, and the FTC declined to comment. Deere has denied any wrongdoing.

Ruling adds to legal woes

The ruling adds to Deere’s legal woes over repair services. Johnson ruled in 2023 that the company must face similar claims from crop farms and farmers that it illegally restricted maintenance and repair services through the use of authorized dealers.

The FTC and states, like the private plaintiffs, contend that Deere is abusing its market power, allowing the company to control prices and minimize competition.

Deere is blocking farmers from acquiring the “tools and information necessary to repair their equipment in a timely and cost-effective manner,” the FTC had said in a court filing in April.

‘No basis in law’

Deere countered that it does not compete in the market for repair services. The government plaintiffs filed their lawsuit “with two vague federal antitrust claims that hide the ball and have no basis in law,” Deere told the court.

The company also challenged the lawfulness of the structure of the FTC, an independent, bipartisan board that enforces antitrust and consumer protection laws. Deere alleged that restrictions against removing FTC commissioners illegally bar the president from exercising lawful oversight.

Johnston said Deere failed to show how it was harmed by the FTC’s removal procedures.

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U.S. District Judge Brian Miller in Little Rock, Arkansas, said the state can pursue its claims that loyalty programs run by Syngenta and Corteva that provide rebates for pesticide purchases violate federal and state antitrust and consumer-protection laws.

Arkansas’ lawsuit claimed Syngenta and Corteva are paying pesticide distributors or retailers to restrict their purchase of generic crop-protection products that contain specific ingredients.

The lawsuit said distributors and retailers fear losing their loyalty payments and so have no incentive to sell more generics.

Syngenta and Corteva did not immediately respond to requests for comment. They have denied any wrongdoing.

In a statement, Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin, a Republican, said the state “has legitimate claims against the anticompetitive rebate programs” of Syngenta and Corteva and will seek to “hold companies accountable for practices that harm the market and ultimately consumers.”

Syngenta and Corteva in seeking dismissal of the state’s lawsuit said their rebate programs lowered prices and denied they are anticompetitive.

They also said the state should have been barred from bringing antitrust claims on behalf of consumers.

Miller said the state had sufficiently alleged Arkansas residents were paying higher prices for pesticide products based on the claimed anticompetitive conduct.

Syngenta and Corteva are fighting other lawsuits challenging their loyalty programs.

In January, U.S. District Judge Thomas Schroeder in the Winston-Salem federal court said the companies must face some antitrust claims lodged by farmers in California, Texas, Florida and other states.

Schroeder last year also said that a related U.S. Federal Trade Commission lawsuit, filed with a bipartisan group of U.S. states, could move forward.

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U.S. District Judge Thomas Schroeder in a decision on Tuesday said farmers from California, Illinois, Florida, Texas and five other states who sued the companies can proceed for now with some claims under federal and state laws.

Schroeder said the farmers can seek an order to force the pesticide makers to end their allegedly anti-competitive conduct. The judge cut a federal antitrust damages claim, but the farmers could be eligible for compensation under some state law claims remaining in the litigation.

Syngenta and lawyers for the plaintiffs declined to comment, and Corteva did not immediately respond to a request for one.

The farmers’ lawsuit alleged Syngenta and Corteva used loyalty agreements and rebate programs with distributors to block generic manufacturers from making inroads into the market. That allowed the companies to charge higher prices, according to the farmers. Syngenta and Corteva have denied the claims.

The lawsuit mirrors a case being pursued by the FTC and a group of states, including California, Texas, Indiana and Illinois. The alleged exclusive-dealing scheme has caused farmers to overpay annually by “many millions,” according to the FTC.

Schroeder of the federal court in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, in a ruling last year said the government litigation could move ahead.

Syngenta and Corteva had argued the farmers had not shown how they were harmed, since they said they buy products from distributors and retailers and not from the manufacturers.

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McDonald’s said in a lawsuit filed on Friday in Brooklyn federal court that the meatpackers, also including Cargill and National Beef Packing, collectively reduced their output to drive up industry prices since 2015.

The lawsuit is the latest to accuse the world’s largest meatpackers of violating U.S. antitrust law by coordinating on the price they paid for cattle and on slaughter volumes.

“Only colluding meatpackers would expect to benefit by reducing their prices and purchases of slaughtered cattle because they would know that their conspiracy would shield them from the dynamics of a competitive marketplace,” McDonald’s said in its lawsuit.

JBS, Tyson, Cargill and National Beef did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the lawsuit on Monday. McDonald’s had no immediate comment.

The meat producers have denied any wrongdoing in related cases that have been consolidated in Minnesota federal court. The plaintiffs in those cases include BJ’s Wholesale, Sodexo, Target and Aldi.

The beef meatpackers also face lawsuits from U.S. consumers, cattle producers and others that are seeking class-action status and monetary damages in the Minnesota litigation.

Cattle producers who said they sold animals directly to the meatpackers for slaughter said they lost billions in the alleged scheme, court records show.

McDonald’s has 13,000 branded restaurants in the United States, part of its 39,000 restaurant global footprint in more than 100 countries.

McDonald’s said it was seeking unspecified monetary damages and a court to order an end to the alleged price-fixing conspiracy.

U.S. District John Tunheim in Minneapolis is overseeing the coordinated beef antitrust legal proceedings.

In the first settlement, JBS said in 2022 it would pay $52.5 million to resolve some of the purchasers’ class action claims.

The case is McDonald’s Corp v. Cargill et al, U.S. District Court, Eastern District of New York, No. 1:24-cv-07017-TAM.

For McDonald’s: Philip Iovieno Nicholas and Gravante Jr of Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft
For defendants: No appearances yet

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St. Louis-based U.S. District Judge Sarah Pitlyk ruled on Friday that farmers and other plaintiffs failed to present sufficient allegations that the companies had violated U.S. antitrust law.

The farmers said Bayer and others schemed to collectively boycott electronic “crop inputs” platforms, depriving the ability of farms and other purchasers to make effective cost comparisons for key agricultural materials.

Pitlyk said the plaintiffs’ allegations did not rebut the companies’ claims that their practices served legitimate business purposes. She faulted the plaintiffs for advancing “mere generalizations” in their lawsuit.

Bayer, Corteva, Syngenta and BASF, another defendant, welcomed the court’s ruling in separate statements. Bayer said the crop input market is “competitive, fair and diverse.” Corteva said it will continue to “vigorously” compete in agricultural markets.

All of the defendants had denied any wrongdoing.

Attorneys for the plaintiffs at law firms Lockridge Grindal Nauen and Gustafson Gluek declined to comment.

The case includes lawsuits that were filed across the country in 2021. The crop protection chemicals at issue include fungicides, herbicides and insecticides.

Farmers accused wholesale and retail outlets of pressuring manufacturers such as Bayer not to deal with emerging e-commerce platforms that would have opened the crop input market to greater price transparency.

The defendants countered that there was no evidence supporting the plaintiffs’ conspiracy claims, and that any resistance to the electronic platforms “was entirely consistent with each individual defendant’s independent commercial interests.”

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In a ruling on Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Steven Seeger in Chicago said the risk of unfair prejudice against the egg producers and marketers by showing the graphic videos was “extreme” and outweighed any minimal value in the antitrust litigation accusing them of curbing domestic supply in order to charge higher prices.

“After watching the videos, it would not take much for jurors to believe that the egg industry abuses chickens,” Seeger wrote.

Kraft and the other plaintiffs wanted to play the videos at the trial next month to bolster their claim that an industry-wide animal welfare initiative announced in 2002 was a “sham” and actually part of a broader scheme to restrain the supply of eggs.

Seeger’s ruling on the videos was among several orders he issued on Tuesday addressing the scope of what jurors will be allowed to see and hear at the five-week trial.

Kraft and the other plaintiffs, also including General Mills and Nestle, are seeking more than US$110 million in damages against United Egg Producers and other defendants, including two farms.

Lawyers for the defendants on Wednesday did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Representatives for Kraft and the other companies either declined to comment or did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Seeger is presiding over a case that was previously in Philadelphia federal court as part of a multidistrict litigation proceeding. Kraft’s case returned to the Northern District of Illinois in 2019.

Lawyers for Kraft and co-plaintiffs said they obtained the videos from the Humane Society of the United States. They purport to show “day-to-day operations within defendants’ facilities.”

In a court filing, attorneys for United Egg Producers and the other defendants said the videos were “surreptitiously” recorded by animal rights activists and include “highly edited footage.”

The attorneys also said the recordings were irrelevant to the plaintiffs’ claims.

Seeger said the plaintiffs’ lawyers do not need the videos to argue that the egg industry’s promotion of animal welfare was not genuine.

“After personally watching all of the videos, the court is convinced that the videos would undermine the truth-seeking function of the trial,” Seeger wrote.

— Mike Scarcella is a Reuters legal affairs reporter in Washington, D.C.

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The proposed settlement in Minnesota federal court was disclosed on Friday from plaintiffs’ lawyers representing a class of businesses that bought beef for food preparation since 2015.

It is the second deal that the Brazilian beef giant and its U.S. units have struck in the case, after they agreed last year to pay US$52.5 million to grocers and other plaintiffs that make up the “direct” beef purchaser class.

The new settlement, subject to a judge’s review and approval, requires JBS to co-operate in ongoing cases against corporate defendants that have not settled, including Cargill and Tyson Foods.

“This co-operation is valuable and will afford access to transactional data, documents, witnesses, and other information without further litigation and expensive discovery — a significant class-wide benefit,” the plaintiffs’ lawyers said in their request for preliminary approval of the deal.

JBS and lawyers for the company on Monday did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment. JBS denied liability as part of the settlement.

Lawyers for Cargill and Tyson and representatives from the companies either declined to comment or did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment.

JBS and other suppliers were sued in a series of cases alleging price-fixing in various meat markets. JBS has paid tens of millions of dollars to resolve claims from pork purchasers.

In the beef case, commercial plaintiffs including Wisconsin-founded sandwich and soup shop Erbert + Gerbert’s alleged JBS and other meat packers conspired since 2015 to fix the prices of beef.

The plaintiffs’ lawyers said the settlement was “the product of extensive and vigorous arm’s-length negotiations.”

— Mike Scarcella is a legal affairs reporter for Reuters in Washington, D.C.

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