The Washington Supreme Court’s decision in Brown v. Old Navy LLC, 4 Wash.3d 580 (2025) has sparked a wave of putative class actions under Washington’s Commercial Electronic Mail Act (“CEMA”), targeting allegedly misleading email subject lines used by national retailers. In the months since, defendants have increasingly turned to constitutional and federal preemption defenses in an effort to stem this growing tide of litigation. To date, however, those arguments have gained little traction. Several district court decisions have denied defendants’ motions to dismiss on these grounds.Continue Reading District Courts Appear Skeptical of CAN‑SPAM Preemption and Constitutional Challenges to CEMA
End-of-Year 2025 State and Federal Developments in Minors’ Privacy
Since our mid-year recap on minors’ privacy legislation, several significant developments have emerged in the latter half of 2025. We recap the notable developments below.Continue Reading End-of-Year 2025 State and Federal Developments in Minors’ Privacy
Recent Class Actions Under State Anti-Spam Laws Target Retail Email Marketing Practices and Raise Questions about CAN-SPAM Act Preemption
A Washington State Supreme Court decision last spring that construed that state’s Commercial Electronic Mail Act (“CEMA”) to broadly prohibit any misleading information in retailers’ email subject lines has opened the floodgates to similar state spam claims. In the past six months, there have been eight putative class action complaints
Continue Reading Recent Class Actions Under State Anti-Spam Laws Target Retail Email Marketing Practices and Raise Questions about CAN-SPAM Act Preemption