Lawyers Seek $675 Million Fee From $7.25 Billion Bayer Roundup Settlement

Lawyers are seeking what could become one of the largest legal fee awards in history from a proposed $7.25 billion settlement with Bayer over its Roundup weedkiller, pending approval by a Missouri state judge.

Attorneys from six firms — the Holland Law Firm; Ketchmark & McCreight; Seeger Weiss; Motley Rice; Williams Hart & Boundas; and Waters Kraus Paul & Siegel — on Friday requested $675 million in fees for their role in negotiating a deal that would resolve current and future lawsuits alleging that Bayer’s Roundup herbicide causes cancer.

Christopher Seeger of Seeger Weiss said in a statement that the proposed settlement represents one of the largest class recoveries ever and the biggest in Missouri’s history, adding that the 9.3 per cent fee request is far below the one-third benchmark courts typically approve in major class actions.

“This case is unique because class counsel will continue working on it for 17 additional years, and the fee request reflects nearly two decades of additional work, risk and expenses,” said Mike Ketchmark of Ketchmark & McCreight in an email.

The other firms did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The group said the $675 million would also be distributed among additional plaintiffs’ law firms involved in the litigation.

Bayer subsidiary Monsanto said it looks forward to finalising the settlement, which would establish a long-term claims programme funded by capped annual payments over up to 21 years. The agreement covers most pending lawsuits but still requires court approval and a minimum number of plaintiffs to opt in. The company, which denies that glyphosate causes cancer, did not comment on the fee request.

If approved at an upcoming July hearing, the award would rank among the largest ever, exceeding $667 million and $657.1 million fee awards in antitrust cases involving Blue Cross Blue Shield in 2022 and 2025, as well as a $540 million fee award tied to a $6.01 billion 3M settlement in 2024.

In 2024, a federal judge awarded $956 million in legal fees in settlements worth more than $11 billion involving public water systems that sued manufacturers of PFAS chemicals.

Courts weigh multiple factors when assessing whether fee awards are reasonable, including settlement size, hours worked and case complexity. However, judges can be reluctant to approve exceptionally large payouts, and fee ratios typically decline in mega-settlements, said Michael Perino, a law professor at St John’s University in New York.

“When you get into these really large settlements, it’s usual for the judge to feel a little bit of sticker shock,” he said, declining to comment specifically on the Roundup case.

Perino also cited a recent case involving Elon Musk’s $56 billion Tesla pay package, where lawyers sought billions in shares before a Delaware judge rejected the request as excessive and instead awarded $345 million — the largest fee award in the state’s history. Tesla has appealed the ruling.

“Judges are human beings,” Perino said. “At some point, the judge is going to consciously or unconsciously say, ‘Wow, that seems like a lot of money.’”

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