Ramon Alberto Rodriguez, et al. v. Imperial Brands, PLC, et al.

In Fuld v. Palestine Liberation Organization, 606 U.S. 1 (2025), this Court held that the Fifth Amendment’s Due Process Clause does not incorporate the Fourteenth Amendment’s minimum-contacts standard, without deciding what governs instead. The Court applied the Fourteenth Amendment’s burden-centered reasonableness factors that follow minimum contacts only to confirm that the statute before it would satisfy them even if required. The Eleventh Circuit nonetheless applied those factors to bar personal jurisdiction under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 4(k)(2) over foreign corporations sued on a federal cause of action — here, Title III of the HelmsBurton Act. No other court of appeals has decided what standard governs Rule 4(k)(2) after Fuld; the decision below is the first. The question presented is: What standard does the Fifth Amendment supply for personal jurisdiction under Rule 4(k)(2) over a foreign defendant — and, in particular, do the burden-centered reasonableness factors of this Court’s Fourteenth Amendment cases (factors Fuld never held required) supply that standard and defeat the jurisdiction federal law provides?