Ninth Circuit Issues Significant Decision Holding That Absent Class Members Must Demonstrate Article III Standing At Summary Judgment
Client Alert | January 12, 2026
Healy v. Milliman, Inc., No. 24-3327 – Decided January 9, 2026.
The Ninth Circuit has held for the first time that both named plaintiffs and absent class members must present evidence of standing at summary judgment. Its decision also identified an array of prior circuit opinions that, in light of recent Supreme Court standing precedent, are no longer good law.
“[W]e hold that TransUnion requires named and unnamed members of a certified class for money damages to demonstrate that there is a genuine dispute of material fact over standing at summary judgment.”
Judge Sidney R. Thomas, writing for the Court
Background:
James Healy, an unsuccessful life-insurance applicant, brought a class action against Milliman, an independent firm that provides medical-history data and coverage recommendations to insurance companies, claiming that Milliman’s reports are sometimes inaccurate and so violate the Fair Credit Reporting Act. After the district court certified a class of similar applicants, Milliman sought summary judgment, arguing that there was insufficient evidence that all class members had suffered an Article III injury.
Courts have long recognized that, at the outset of a putative class action, only the named plaintiff must have Article III standing to survive dismissal. And in TransUnion LLC v. Ramirez, 594 U.S. 413 (2021), the Supreme Court held that “[e]very class member must have Article III standing in order to recover individual damages.” Id. at 431.
In Healy v. Milliman, Inc., — F.4th —, 2026 WL 71863 (9th Cir. Jan. 9, 2026), the Ninth Circuit confronted a novel question: whether absent class members need to demonstrate Article III standing after class certification but before final judgment. The district court granted summary judgment in Milliman’s favor, ruling that there was insufficient direct evidence of Article III standing across the class, and the Ninth Circuit accepted interlocutory review under 28 U.S.C. § 1292(b) to address the issue.
Issue Presented:
Must absent class members present evidence of Article III standing at summary judgment after a class has been certified?
Court’s Holding:
Yes. Named plaintiffs and absent class members alike must produce evidence of Article III standing to survive summary judgment.
What It Means:
- The decision emphasizes that Article III standing is relevant not only at final judgment, when class members stand to recover individual damages, but also at earlier stages of the litigation. The Ninth Circuit expressly rejected the notion “that the standing inquiry for unnamed class members” should “wait until the final stage of a damages action.”
- The Ninth Circuit identified a slew of prior circuit decisions that, “to the extent they would have permitted unnamed class members to go without demonstrating standing at trial” or later stages of the litigation, are no longer good law after TransUnion. In the past, many of those decisions have been heavily cited by plaintiffs seeking class certification and attempting to minimize the burden that Article III imposes on absent class members.
- The decision also makes clear that while absent class members must present evidence of Article III standing at summary judgment, the evidence is assessed under traditional summary-judgment standards. The Ninth Circuit remanded so the district court could perform that analysis in the first instance, emphasizing that evidence of class-member injury may be circumstantial as well as direct.
- In focusing on whether there was sufficient evidence from which a factfinder “could reasonably infer that there was class-wide standing,” the Ninth Circuit did not address what should happen if, at summary judgment, the evidence indicates that some but not all class members have standing.
- The opinion in Healy comes amid an ongoing debate about Article III standing in class actions, including the role that Article III plays at class certification. The Ninth Circuit has multiple cases currently pending before it in which the court will assess whether a class may be certified when a substantial number of class members lack Article III standing. The ongoing confusion—in the Ninth Circuit and other courts of appeals—over those questions stems from the Supreme Court’s decision, in June 2025, to dismiss as improvidently granted a case in which it was poised to decide whether a damages class could be certified when its members lack standing.
Gibson Dunn attorneys are available to assist in addressing any questions you may have regarding these developments. Please contact the Gibson Dunn lawyer with whom you usually work in the firm’s Class Actions or Appellate and Constitutional Law practice groups, or any of the following lawyers:
Class Actions:
Christopher Chorba – Los Angeles (+1 213.229.7396, cchorba@gibsondunn.com)
Kahn A. Scolnick – Los Angeles (+1 213.229.7656, kscolnick@gibsondunn.com)
Appellate and Constitutional Law:
Thomas H. Dupree Jr. – Washington, D.C. (+1 202.955.8547, tdupree@gibsondunn.com)
Allyson N. Ho – Dallas (+1 214.698.3233, aho@gibsondunn.com)
Julian W. Poon – Los Angeles (+ 213.229.7758, jpoon@gibsondunn.com)
Bradley J. Hamburger – Los Angeles (+1 213.229.7658, bhamburger@gibsondunn.com)
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