- We have previously blogged about a lawsuit filed by Upside Foods challenging Florida’s cultivated meat ban. Last month, a district court judge rejected Upside’s request for a preliminary injunction and held that the company had failed to meet its burden to establish that it was substantially likely to succeed on the merits of its express preemption claims.
- The court addressed the merits of the preemption argument with respect to both the “ingredient requirements” and the “premises, facilities, and operations” provisions in the Poultry Products Inspection Act (21 USC 467e). As to the ingredient requirements provision, the Court found that Plaintiff had identified no statute or regulation which required that cultivated poultry products be permitted and noted that “just because Plaintiff’s product arguably falls within the scope of the PPIA . . . this does not mean that a state is expressly preempted from banning the sale of that particular kind of poultry product.”
- With respect to the “premises, facilities, and operations” provision, the Court held that (1) Plaintiff did not manufacture cultivated chicken in Florida and so its operations were not directly impacted and (2) that a sales ban did not impose additional or different facilities requirements as compared to federal law.
- Notably the case is not a final decision on the merits and we will continue to monitor and report on the case.