CFS and a broad coalition of farmworkers, farmers, and conservationists, file a federal lawsuit against the EPA over its January 2020 re-approval of glyphosate. On Dec. 17, 2020, CFS files the opening arguments and evidence, showing how EPA ignored glyphosate's health risks, including cancer risks, to farmworkers and farmers exposed during spraying, disregarded glyphosate's ecological impacts and failed to account for the costs to farmers from glyphosate-resistant "superweeds" and off-field drift damage. On May 18, 2021, EPA seeks partial voluntary remand of its Interim Decision, specifically of the portions of the Interim Decision that do not relate to its conclusions on human health risks or the usage and benefits of glyphosate. This remand would include the Agency’s analysis of the ecological risks and other potential costs associated with glyphosate and EPA’s weighing of such risks against the benefits of glyphosate. The remaining challenges in this action, should EPA’s motion be granted, will be to EPA’s human-health risk analysis and the lack of ESA consultation. EPA also seeks such partial remand without vacatur of the interim risk mitigation measures specified by the Interim Decision. On Jan. 10, 2021, attorney Amy van Saun presented oral arguments in the lawsuit. The three-judge panel seemed inclined to agree the agency may have not taken into account all the available information in making its 2020 decision, but also seemed coy about removing all glyphosate products from the market.
The CFS application is joined with similar applications by the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and the Pesticide Action Network North America (PANNA). On June 17, 2022, the Court of Appeals issued a joint response, upholding the plaintiffs' claims that EPA failed to adequately assess whether glyphosate could cause cancer, and failed to meet its obligations under the Endangered Species Act (ESA). The federal appeals court calls EPA's analysis of glyphosate "flawed," and orders EPA to reconsider its 2020 finding that glyphosate posed "no health risk to people exposed to it by any means."