The California Courts of Appeal Reject the Standing Analysis in Viking River Cruises

The California Courts of Appeal uniformly hold that, a plaintiff, whose individual PAGA claims have been sent to arbitration following the United States Supreme Court's decision in Viking River Cruises, Inc. v. Moriana, 142 S. Ct. 1906, 1916 (2022), still has standing to prosecute representative, or "non-individual" PAGA claims. So holding, the Courts of Appeal reject Justice Alito's analysis in Viking River Cruises and instead follow the standing analysis by the California Supreme Court in Kim v. Reins, 9 Cal. 5th 73 (2020). See Nickson v. Shemran, Inc., ___ Cal. Rptr. 3d ___, 2023 WL 2820860, *6-7 (April 7, 2023); Seifu v. Lyft, Inc., ___ Cal. Rptr. 3d ___, 2023 WL 2705285, *6-7 (March 30, 2023); Galarsa v. Dolgen California, LLC, 88 Cal. App. 5^th 639, 652-655 (2023); Piplack v. In-N-Out Burgers, 88 Cal. App. 5^th 1281, 1291-1293 (2023); and, Gregg v. Uber Tech., Inc., 89 Cal. App. 5^th 786 (2023). See also Quintero v. Dolgen Cal., LLC, 2023 WL 1878201 (Cal. Ct. App. Feb. 10, 2023) (in an unpublished opinion, another Court of Appeal reached the same conclusion).

The California Supreme Court held oral argument in Adolph v. Uber Technologies, Inc., Case No. S274671, which addresses the standing issue, on May 9, 2023. Nothing presented in the oral arguments appeared to present any basis for the California Supreme Court to reject its analysis in Kim v. Reins and adopt that proposed by Justice Alito