Clean Label Project Found. v. Garden of Life, LLC

CLEAN LABEL PROJECT FOUNDATION, Plaintiff, v. GARDEN OF LIFE, LLC, Defendant.

Civil Action No. 20-3229 (RC)

United States District Court, District of Columbia

September 23, 2021

Re Document No.: 7

MEMORANDUM OPINION

GRANTING DEFENDANT GARDEN OF LIFE, LLC'S MOTION TO DISMISS

RUDOLPH CONTRERAS, UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE.

I. INTRODUCTION

Plaintiff Clean Label Project Foundation (“CLP”), a non-profit organization, has brought this action against Garden of Life, LLC (“Garden of Life”), a provider of branded supplements, alleging that Garden of Life engaged in unlawful trade practices in violation of the District of Columbia Consumer Protection Procedures Act (“CPPA”). Defendant Garden of Life has moved to dismiss this suit pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1) for lack of subject matter jurisdiction, and pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6) for failure to state a claim. It argues that CLP lacks Article III standing, that this action infringes on Garden of Life's freedom of speech, and that the suit also runs afoul of the primary jurisdiction doctrine, which would entrust questions of this nature to federal and state regulators. For the reasons discussed below, the Court concludes that because CLP has not alleged an injury in fact it lacks standing and, thus, the complaint must be dismissed.

II. FACTUAL BACKGROUND

Defendant Garden of Life is a dietary supplement company that sells prenatal vitamins, including the following product lines: Garden of Life Vitamin Code Raw Prenatal (180ct), Garden of Life MyKind Organics Prenatal Multi-Certified Organic Whole Food (90ct), Garden of Life Dr. Formulated Probiotics-Once Daily Prenatal (30ct), Garden of Life Oceans Mom Prenatal DHA (30ct), Garden of Life MyKind Organics Prenatal Once Daily (30ct), Garden of Life MyKind Organics Prenatal Once Daily (90ct), and Garden of Life MyKind Organics Prenatal (30ct) (collectively, “the Products”). See Compl. ¶ 24, ECF No. 1-1. These products are sold to District of Columbia consumers through retail stores and online marketplaces. Id. ¶¶ 22, 44. CLP alleges that in order to capture the market for prenatal vitamins and supplements, Garden of Life marketed the Products with descriptions such as “Clean Nourishment for You & Your Baby Before, During & After Pregnancy, ” id. ¶ 21, “Clean is healthy, ” id. ¶ 88, and promises customers that it is “uncompromising about your health, ” id. ¶ 90.

CLP is a non-profit public interest organization that describes its mission as “educat[ing] the public and enabl[ing] consumers to make informed shopping choices, ” id. ¶ 37, part of which includes “bring[ing] truth and transparency to food and consumer products labeling, ” id. ¶ 138. To further this mission, in the fall of 2018 CLP caused the purchase of the Products and had an accredited third-party chemistry laboratory perform quantitative testing. Id. ¶¶ 25, 100- 102. The results found that the Products “contained quantifiable levels of heavy metals as well as detectable amounts of WHO Class II Pesticides and BPA, ” substances that CLP asserts “are extremely dangerous to a fetus.” Id. ¶ 25-26. CLP contends that in light of these findings, Garden of Life mislabeled, falsely advertised, and adulterated the products, causing ongoing harm to D.C. consumers. Id. 112-120.

CLP has now brought suit pursuant to the CPPA, D.C. Code § 28-3901 et seq. The CPPA permits nonprofit organizations to bring actions “on behalf of itself or any of its members, or on any such behalf and on behalf of the general public, ” and also allows “public interest organization[s]” to bring actions “on behalf of the interests of a consumer or a class of consumers.” D.C. Code § 28-3905(k)(1)(C), (D). CLP alleges that Garden of Life engaged in unlawful trade practices under the CPPA when it marketed and sold prenatal vitamin products in a manner that misled consumers into believing that the products were free of contaminants and superior to competing products, when in fact they were contaminated with toxic heavy metals, pesticides, and BPA. Compl. ¶¶ 123-31 (describing violation of D.C. Code § 28-3904). CLP also alleges that the presence of these contaminants, which are “injurious to health, ” render Garden of Life's prenatal vitamins “adulterated” in violation of D.C. Code § 48-103. Id. ¶ 132.

CLP asks the Court for the following relief: (1) a declaration that Garden of Life's conduct is in violation of the CPPA; (2) an order enjoining this conduct; (3) an order requiring Garden of Life “to provide corrective advertising to the residents of the District of Columbia that restores consumers”; (4) an order granting CLP's “costs and disbursements, including reasonable attorneys' fees and expert fees, and prejudgment interest at the maximum rate allowable by law”; and (5) punitive damages and any further relief deemed just and proper by the Court. Compl. at 28.

III. PROCEDURAL HISTORY

CLP filed this action in the Superior Court for the District of Columbia on August 25, 2020. The case was removed to this Court on November 9, 2020. Notice of Removal, ECF No. 1. That same month, Garden of Life filed a motion to dismiss the complaint. See Def.'s Mot. to Dismiss (“Def.'s Mot.”), ECF No. 7. The motion is opposed by CLP. See Pl.'s Resp. in Opp'n to Def.'s Mot. to Dismiss (“Pl.'s Opp'n”), ECF No. 10. Garden of Life has also filed a reply. See Def.'s Reply in Supp. of Def.'s Mot. to Dismiss (“Def.'s Reply”), ECF No. 11. The motion is now ripe for consideration.^[1]

IV. LEGAL STANDARD^[2]

Federal courts are courts of limited jurisdiction and the law presumes that “a cause lies outside this limited jurisdiction.” Kokkonen v. Guardian Life Ins. Co. of Am., 511 U.S. 375, 377 (1994); see also Gen. Motors Corp. v. EPA, 363 F.3d 442, 448 (D.C. Cir. 2004). On a motion to dismiss for lack of subject matter jurisdiction pursuant to Rule 12(b)(1), the plaintiff bears the burden of establishing by a preponderance of the evidence that the court has subject matter jurisdiction. Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 561 (1992).

A court resolving a Rule 12(b)(1) motion must “accept[ ] the factual allegations in the complaint as true, ” Jerome Stevens Pharm., Inc. v. FDA, 402 F.3d 1249, 1253-54 (D.C. Cir. 2005), and “must construe the complaint in favor of the complaining party, ” Warth v. Seldin, 422 U.S. 490, 501 (1975). However, because subject matter jurisdiction focuses on the court's power to even hear the claim, a court is to apply closer scrutiny when resolving a Rule 12(b)(1) motion compared to a Rule 12(b)(6) motion for failure to state a claim. See Food & Water Watch, Inc. v. Vilsack, 808 F.3d 905, 913 (D.C. Cir. 2015) (explaining that, in the context of standing analysis under the Rule 12(b)(1) legal standard, “we do not assume the truth of legal conclusions, nor do we accept inferences that are unsupported by the facts set out in the complaint”) (quoting Arpaio v. Obama, 797 F.3d 11, 19 (D.C. Cir. 2015)); see also Jathoul v. Clinton, 880 F.Supp.2d 168, 170 (D.D.C. 2012) (“‘[T]he [p]laintiff's factual allegations in the complaint . . . will bear closer scrutiny in resolving a 12(b)(1) motion' than in resolving a 12(b)(6) motion for failure to state a claim.”) (quoting Grand Lodge of Fraternal Ord. of Police v. Ashcroft, 185 F.Supp.2d 9, 13-14 (D.D.C. 2001)). For this reason, “[w]here necessary to resolve a jurisdictional challenge under Rule 12(b)(1), ‘the court may consider the complaint supplemented by undisputed facts evidenced in the record, or the complaint supplemented by undisputed facts plus the court's resolution of disputed facts.'” Banneker Ventures, LLC v. Graham, 798 F.3d 1119, 1129 (D.C. Cir. 2015) (quoting Herbert v. Nat'l Acad. of Scis., 974 F.2d 192, 197 (D.C. Cir. 1992)).

V. ANALYSIS

Garden of Life has moved to dismiss the complaint on two grounds. It argues first a lack of subject matter jurisdiction, claiming that CLP has not properly alleged Article III standing. Def.'s Mot. at 9-11. Garden of Life also contends that CLP does not present a claim on which relief can be granted, asserting that the application of the CPPA here would violate Garden of Life's freedom of speech, as well as run afoul of the doctrine of primary jurisdiction. Id. at 12- 22. For the reasons discussed below, the Court will grant Garden of Life's motion to dismiss for lack of subject matter jurisdiction.

The Court begins, as it must, with the jurisdictional question: whether it has subject matter jurisdiction to review this action. This requires that CLP have Article III standing to bring this suit. See U.S. Const. art. III, § 2 (limiting federal courts' jurisdiction to “Cases” and “Controversies”); see also Hancock v. Urb. Outfitters, Inc., 830 F.3d 511, 513 (D.C. Cir. 2016) (explaining that “[o]ne ‘essential and unchanging' component of federal court jurisdiction is the ‘requirement that a litigant have standing to invoke the authority of a federal court'”) (quoting Daimler Chrysler Corp. v. Cuno, 547 U.S. 332, 342 (2006)). CLP claims that it “has met all of the elements for organizational standing.” Pl.'s Opp'n at 1. The Court disagrees.

1. Legal Standard

To establish the existence of a case or controversy, “the plaintiff ‘must clearly . . . allege facts demonstrating' each element” of Article III standing. Spokeo, Inc. v. Robins, 136 S.Ct. 1540 1547 (2016) (quoting Warth, 422 U.S. at 518); see also Arpaio, 797 F.3d at 19 (“The plaintiff bears the burden of invoking the court's subject matter jurisdiction, including establishing the elements of standing.”) (citing Lujan, 504 U.S. at 561). “To establish standing, a plaintiff must show (1) it has suffered a ‘concrete and particularized' injury (2) that is ‘fairly traceable to the challenged action of the...