(Slip Opinion) OCTOBER TERM, 2025 1
Syllabus
NOTE: Where it is feasible, a syllabus (headnote) will be released, as is
being done in connection with this case, at the time the opinion is issued.
The syllabus constitutes no part of the opinion of the Court but has been
prepared by the Reporter of Decisions for the convenience of the reader.
See United States v. Detroit Timber & Lumber Co., 200 U. S. 321, 337.
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
Syllabus
EXXON MOBIL CORP. v. CORPORACIÓN CIMEX, S. A.
(CUBA), ET AL.
CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR
THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT
No. 24–699. Argued February 23, 2026—Decided June 23, 2026 In 1960, after Fidel Castro seized power in Cuba, the Cuban Government
confiscated many foreign-owned assets, including Exxon’s oil refinery,
terminals, packaging plants, and more than a hundred service stations. Since then, two Cuban government-owned companies—Unión
Cuba-Petróleo (CUPET) and Corporación CIMEX, S. A. (Cuba)
(CIMEX)—have operated and profited from Exxon’s expropriated assets. Exxon had no good way to sue the Cuban government entities
and seek compensation for its confiscated property until Congress
passed and President Clinton signed the Helms-Burton Act in 1996.
As relevant here, the Act created a private right of action for U. S. nationals whose property was confiscated by the Cuban Government
against “any person that . . . traffics in” the confiscated property, 22
U. S. C. §6082(a)(1)(A), with “person” defined to include “any agency
or instrumentality of a foreign state,” §6023(11). Exxon sued CUPET,
CIMEX, and later CIMEX’s Panamanian alter ego under the HelmsBurton Act in the U. S. District Court for the District of Columbia,
seeking more than $1 billion in damages. The Cuban governmentowned companies moved to dismiss, asserting immunity under the
generally applicable Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (FSIA). Exxon
countered that the Helms-Burton Act itself waived the defendants’
sovereign immunity. The District Court sided with the Cuban government defendants, and a divided panel of the U. S. Court of Appeals for
the D. C. Circuit affirmed. 111 F. 4th 12, 23.
Held: The Helms-Burton Act itself abrogates the sovereign immunity of Cuban agencies and instrumentalities; plaintiffs who sue Cuban agencies or instrumentalities under the Act need not also satisfy one of 2 EXXON MOBIL CORP. v. CORPORACIÓN
CIMEX, S. A. (CUBA)
Syllabus
FSIA’s enumerated exceptions to foreign sovereign immunity.
A congressional waiver of sovereign immunity must be “clearly discernible from the sum total” of Congress’s “work,” Department of Agriculture Rural Development Rural Housing Service v. Kirtz, 601 U. S.
42, 55. Four points, taken together, lead to the conclusion that the
Helms-Burton Act clearly abrogated the foreign sovereign immunity of
Cuban agencies and instrumentalities. Pp. 5–22.
(a) First, under this Court’s precedents, a statute creating a cause of
action that explicitly applies against a sovereign waives the immunity
of that sovereign “even without a separate waiver provision,” id., at 53.
The Helms-Burton Act’s cause of action expressly applies against Cuban agencies and instrumentalities: Section 6082(a)(1)(A) confers a
private right of action for any U. S. national whose “property” was
“confiscated by the Cuban Government,” running against “any person
that . . . traffics in” the confiscated property, and Section 6023(11) defines “person” to include “any agency or instrumentality of a foreign
state.” This Court’s general sovereign immunity precedents—most recently Kirtz—hold that when Congress creates a cause of action and
expressly applies it against government agencies or instrumentalities,
Congress has abrogated sovereign immunity, see id., at 49–50. Pp. 8–
11.
(b) Second, Congress does not ordinarily enact self-defeating statutes, see Quarles v. United States, 587 U. S. 645, 654, or “authorize a
suit against a sovereign with one hand, only to bar it with the other,”
Financial Oversight and Management Bd. for P. R. v. Centro De Periodismo Investigativo, Inc., 598 U. S. 339, 348. The Cuban government
defendants’ interpretation would largely negate the Helms-Burton
Act’s cause of action because the potentially relevant FSIA exceptions—the expropriation exception, 28 U. S. C. §1605(a)(3), and the
commercial-activity exception, §1605(a)(2)—would require a plaintiff
to demonstrate that the Cuban instrumentalities engaged in commercial activity in the United States or committed acts with direct effects
in the United States. But a plaintiff suing under the Helms-Burton Act
could almost never meet those exceptions because the Act simultaneously codified a comprehensive economic embargo against Cuba and
barred most commercial interactions between Americans and Cubans.
See 22 U. S. C. §6032(h); see, e.g., 31 CFR §§515.201(b), 515.204.
Pp. 11–13.
(c) Third, the Helms-Burton Act provides that suits under the Act
fall within the general federal-question jurisdiction of 28 U. S. C.
§1331, not under the FSIA’s §1330. Title 22 U. S. C. §6082(c)(1) states
that Title 28’s provisions apply to suits under the Act “to the same extent as . . . any other action brought under section 1331 of title 28.”
(Emphasis added.) By making suits under the Helms-Burton Act
Cite as: 609 U. S. ___ (2026) 3
Syllabus
subject to §1331 rather than §1330, Congress made clear that actions
under the Act are not actions under the FSIA. Pp. 13–15.
(d) Fourth, the Helms-Burton Act grants the President plenary
power to suspend suits under the Act based on current national security and foreign policy assessments, operating similarly to how foreign
sovereign immunity operated before the 1976 enactment of the FSIA.
Under both the Act and the pre-FSIA immunity regime, immunity decisions were the province of the Executive Branch. It is not plausible
to conclude that Congress chose to reinstate the pre-FSIA immunity
regime in the Helms-Burton Act while simultaneously subjecting suits
under the Act to the FSIA. Pp. 15–18.
(e) The Cuban government defendants’ counterarguments fail. The
implied-repeal canon does not apply because the Helms-Burton Act
contains many express indications that the Act is a standalone statutory exception to foreign sovereign immunity. And contrary to the Cuban government defendants’ arguments, Congress does not need to use
“magic words” to abrogate sovereign immunity, Kirtz, 601 U. S., at 48;
Congress must simply make a waiver “clearly discernable” from the
“sum total” of its work, id., at 55 (quotation marks omitted), which the
Helms-Burton Act did through its many provisions indicating that Cuban agencies and instrumentalities could and would be sued. That an
earlier draft of the Helms-Burton Act expressly waived sovereign immunity while the final version did not is simply another magic-words
requirement. Pp. 18–21.
111 F. 4th 12, reversed and remanded.
KAVANAUGH, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which ROBERTS, C. J., and THOMAS, ALITO, GORSUCH, and BARRETT, JJ., joined. KAGAN, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which SOTOMAYOR and JACKSON, JJ., joined.
Cite as: 609 U. S. ____ (2026) 1
Opinion of the Court
NOTICE: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in the
United States Reports. Readers are requested to notify the Reporter of
Decisions, Supreme Court of the United States, Washington, D. C. 20543,
pio@supremecourt.gov, of any typographical or other formal errors.
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
No. 24–699
EXXON MOBIL CORPORATION, PETITIONER v.
CORPORACIÓN CIMEX, S. A. (CUBA), ET AL.
ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF
APPEALS FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT
[June 23, 2026]
JUSTICE KAVANAUGH delivered the opinion of the Court.
In 1960, a year after assuming power in Cuba, Fidel
Castro declared that the new Communist government
would seize all “Yankee property” in Cuba. Castro made
good on that promise. The Cuban Government confiscated
a variety of American businesses then operating in Cuba,
including Exxon’s oil refinery and service stations. Cuba
transferred Exxon’s property to Cuban government-owned
companies.
In 1996, to afford victims of “Castro’s wrongful seizures”
a “judicial remedy in the courts of the United States,”
Congress passed and President Clinton signed the HelmsBurton Act, formally known as the Cuban Liberty and
Democratic Solidarity Act. §301, 110 Stat. 815, 22 U. S. C.
§6081. That Act created a private right of action for U. S.
nationals whose property was unlawfully confiscated: They
may sue Cuban agencies and instrumentalities that
possess, use, or otherwise traffic in the confiscated
property.
Foreign sovereigns, including their agencies and
instrumentalities, are presumptively immune from suit in
U. S. courts. The question here is whether the Helms2 EXXON MOBIL CORP. v. CORPORACIÓN
CIMEX, S. A. (CUBA)
Opinion of the Court
Burton Act abrogates the foreign sovereign immunity of
Cuban agencies and instrumentalities—or whether
plaintiffs such as Exxon suing under the Act must also
satisfy one of the exceptions to immunity in the generally
applicable Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976, or
FSIA. 90 Stat. 2891, 28 U. S. C. §§1330, 1602 et seq.
We conclude that the Helms-Burton Act itself abrogates
the sovereign immunity of Cuban agencies and
instrumentalities. Therefore, plaintiffs who sue Cuban
agencies or instrumentalities under the Act are not
required to also satisfy an FSIA exception.
I
In the first half of the 1900s, American businesses
invested heavily in Cuba’s economy. Exxon Mobil
Corporation (Exxon), then known as Standard Oil,
maintained an active presence in Cuba: It owned and
operated an oil refinery, terminals, packaging plants, and
more than a hundred service stations.
In 1959, Fidel Castro seized power in Cuba, ushering in
Communist control that continues to this day. In the wake
of Castro’s takeover, the Cuban Government confiscated
many foreign-owned assets.
As relevant here, Castro’s regime confiscated Exxon’s
refinery, terminals, plants, and service stations. Since
then, two Cuban government-owned companies, Unión
Cuba-Petróleo (CUPET) and Corporación CIMEX S. A.
(Cuba) (CIMEX), have operated and profited from Exxon’s
expropriated assets.
In 1969, pursuant to its statutory mandate to determine
the validity and size of U. S. nationals’ claims against the
Cuban Government, the U. S. Foreign Claims Settlement
Commission certified the value of Exxon’s claim for
confiscated property at more than $70 million. See
International Claims Settlement Act of 1949, ch. 54, §1, 64
Stat. 12, 22 U. S. C. §1621 et seq. With prejudgment
Cite as: 609 U. S. ____ (2026) 3
Opinion of the Court
interest and statutory treble damages, that figure now
exceeds $1 billion.
For decades afterwards, Exxon had no good way to sue
the Cuban government entities and seek compensation for
its confiscated property. Things started to change in 1996,
when Cuba shot down two unarmed private planes in
international airspace, killing three American citizens.
That incident generated outrage in the United States, and
soon thereafter, Congress passed and President Clinton
signed the Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity Act.
110 Stat. 785, 22 U. S. C. §6021 et seq. That Act is
commonly known as the Helms-Burton Act after its
principal congressional sponsors, Senator Jesse Helms and
Representative Dan Burton.
The Act codified the longstanding American economic
embargo against Cuba and otherwise increased sanctions
and pressure on the Castro regime. §6032(h); see, e.g.,
§6034.
The Act also created a new private right of action for any
U. S. national who “owns the claim” to “property which was
confiscated by the Cuban Government on or after January
1, 1959.” §6082(a)(1)(A). The right of action runs against
“any person that . . . traffics in” the confiscated property.
Ibid. The Act expansively defines “person” as “any person
or entity, including any agency or instrumentality of a
foreign state.” §6023(11).
The Act likewise defines trafficking broadly. A Cuban
agency or instrumentality “traffics” in confiscated property
if, among other things, it “knowingly and intentionally”:
“sells, transfers, [or] distributes” the property; “purchases, leases, receives, [or] possesses” an interest in the property; “engages in a commercial activity using or otherwise
benefiting from” the property; or “causes, directs,
participates in, or profits from” such trafficking. §6023(13).
Importantly, the Helms-Burton Act grants the President
plenary gatekeeping power over whether lawsuits under
4 EXXON MOBIL CORP. v. CORPORACIÓN
CIMEX, S. A. (CUBA)
Opinion of the Court
the Act can proceed in court. Section 6085(c)(1)(B)
authorizes the President to “suspend the right to bring an
action . . . with respect to confiscated property” for six
months at a time “if the President determines . . . that such
suspension is necessary to the national interests of the
United States and will expedite a transition to democracy
in Cuba.” See also §§6085(b), 6085(c)(2), 6082(h)(1), 6064(a)
(conferring additional suspension authorities on the
President).
From 1996 until 2019, Presidents Clinton, Bush, Obama,
and Trump continuously exercised the Act’s suspension
authority, thereby preventing suits under the HelmsBurton Act from moving forward in U. S. courts.
On May 2, 2019, President Trump’s Administration
ended the longstanding suspension. The Secretary of State
announced: “Detente with the regime has failed.” Press
Release, Michael R. Pompeo, Secretary of State, Remarks
to the Press (Apr. 17, 2019). And he explained that “holding
the Cuban Government accountable for seizing American
assets” was the United States’ new policy toward Cuba.
Ibid.
That same day, in the U. S. District Court for the District
of Columbia, Exxon sued various Cuban government-owned
companies: CUPET, CIMEX, and later also CIMEX’s
Panamanian alter ego, Corporación CIMEX S. A.
(Panama). Exxon alleged that CUPET and CIMEX had
seized Exxon’s Cuban operations and used Exxon’s refinery,
terminals, plants, and service stations to produce, refine,
and sell oil and gas. Exxon sought more than $1 billion,
reflecting the value of its Commission-certified claim,
prejudgment interest, and statutory treble damages.
The Cuban government-owned companies moved to
dismiss. As wholly owned instrumentalities of Cuba, they
asserted immunity under the Foreign Sovereign
Immunities Act and argued that Exxon had not satisfied
any of the FSIA’s enumerated exceptions to foreign
Cite as: 609 U. S. ____ (2026) 5
Opinion of the Court
sovereign immunity. 90 Stat. 2891, 28 U. S. C. §§1330,
1602 et seq. Exxon countered that the Helms-Burton Act
itself waived the Cuban government defendants’ sovereign
immunity by creating a cause of action that expressly
applied against foreign agencies and instrumentalities. See
§§6082(a)(1)(A), 6023(11). According to Exxon, it did not
need to also satisfy an FSIA exception to foreign sovereign
immunity.
The District Court sided with the Cuban government
defendants. 534 F. Supp. 3d 1 (2021). A divided panel of
the U. S. Court of Appeals for the D. C. Circuit affirmed in
relevant part, concluding that the Helms-Burton Act
“harmoniously coexists with the FSIA.” 111 F. 4th 12, 23
(2024). The court ruled that Exxon therefore was required
to show that its suit fell within one of the FSIA’s exceptions.
Judge Randolph dissented. In his view, the HelmsBurton Act “established a specific, independent, and
exclusive cause of action” that “considered alone, deprives
the Cuban defendants of immunity from suit.” Id., at 37,
39 (emphasis deleted).
In light of the importance of the issue to the Nation’s
foreign policy interests, this Court granted certiorari. 606
U. S. 1065 (2025).
II
A
Historically, U. S. courts applied foreign sovereign
immunity as a common-law doctrine. In the years
preceding 1952, for the most part, this meant U. S. courts
deferred to the State Department on whether a foreign
sovereign was immune from suit.
In practice, foreign sovereigns that were sued in U. S.
courts could seek a “suggestion of immunity” from the State
Department. Samantar v. Yousuf, 560 U. S. 305, 311 (2010)
(quotation marks omitted). The State Department usually
acquiesced in those requests from friendly sovereigns. And
6 EXXON MOBIL CORP. v. CORPORACIÓN
CIMEX, S. A. (CUBA)
Opinion of the Court
the courts in turn followed the State Department’s lead by
affording common-law immunity to those sovereigns. See,
e.g., Ex parte Peru, 318 U. S. 578, 588 (1943) (“[C]ourts are
required to accept and follow the executive determination
that the vessel is immune”); see Samantar, 560 U. S., at
311–312 (explaining pre-FSIA practice); Republic of
Argentina v. NML Capital, Ltd., 573 U. S. 134, 140 (2014).
In 1952, the State Department adopted what is known as
the “restrictive” theory of foreign sovereign immunity. See
Turkiye Halk Bankasi A.S. v. United States, 598 U. S. 264,
271 (2023). Courts continued to defer to the State
Department, but the State Department would support
immunity only for a foreign sovereign’s public acts and not
for its strictly commercial acts.
The restrictive theory “proved troublesome” in practice.
Verlinden B. V. v. Central Bank of Nigeria, 461 U. S. 480,
487 (1983). Under that regime, foreign governments placed
substantial diplomatic and political pressure on the State
Department. That pressure often led to inconsistent State
Department positions, which in turn exacerbated tensions
with foreign nations. See Turkiye Halk Bankasi, 598 U. S.,
at 271–272.
In 1976, Congress intervened. To ensure more
consistency, reduce international friction, and mitigate
some of the Executive Branch’s difficulties in dealing with
immunity requests from foreign nations, Congress passed
and President Ford signed the Foreign Sovereign
Immunities Act, or FSIA. 90 Stat. 2891.
The FSIA establishes a “baseline principle of immunity
for foreign states and their instrumentalities.” Turkiye
Halk Bankasi, 598 U. S., at 272 (citing 28 U. S. C. §1604).
In particular, under the FSIA, courts lack subject-matter
jurisdiction over suits against a foreign state, or against its agencies or instrumentalities, unless an enumerated
exception applies. See CC/Devas (Mauritius) Ltd. v. Antrix
Corp., 605 U. S. 223, 234 (2025); 28 U. S. C. §§1330(a),
Cite as: 609 U. S. ____ (2026) 7
Opinion of the Court
1605–1607. And the FSIA transferred “primary
responsibility for deciding claims of foreign states to
immunity from the State Department to the courts.”
Samantar, 560 U. S., at 313 (quotation marks omitted).
For present purposes, two FSIA exceptions are relevant.
The first, the commercial activity exception, allows suits
against foreign sovereigns, including their agencies and
instrumentalities, based on “an act outside the territory of
the United States in connection with a commercial activity
of the foreign state elsewhere” when the act at issue “causes
a direct effect in the United States.” §1605(a)(2). We will
come back to that exception below; for now, note that it
requires a plaintiff to show that the foreign agency’s or
instrumentality’s allegedly unlawful act caused a direct
effect in the United States.
The second, the expropriation exception, allows suits
against foreign sovereigns, including their agencies and
instrumentalities, when property rights “taken in violation
of international law are in issue”; the property “is owned or
operated by an agency or instrumentality” of the
expropriating sovereign; and the agency or instrumentality
“is engaged in a commercial activity in the United States.”
§1605(a)(3). We will also come back to that exception below;
for now, note that it requires a plaintiff to show that the
foreign agency or instrumentality is engaged in a
commercial activity in the United States.
B
Time did not stop in 1976 when Congress enacted the
FSIA. And one Congress cannot bind another—meaning
that a later Congress always may repeal or modify an old
law, or enact a new law that is exempt from the old law. In
1996, when Congress passed the Helms-Burton Act,
Congress was free to directly abrogate the foreign sovereign
immunity of Cuban agencies and instrumentalities,
thereby overriding the FSIA. See Bank Markazi v.
8 EXXON MOBIL CORP. v. CORPORACIÓN
CIMEX, S. A. (CUBA)
Opinion of the Court
Peterson, 578 U. S. 212, 236 (2016) (“it remains Congress’
prerogative to alter a foreign state’s immunity”). Exxon
argues that Congress did precisely that when it enacted the
Helms-Burton Act.
We agree with Exxon. Four points, taken together, lead
to that conclusion.
First, the Helms-Burton Act’s cause of action expressly
applies against Cuban agencies and instrumentalities.
Under this Court’s precedents, such statutory language
signals that Congress waived sovereign immunity. Second,
the Act explicitly contemplated that the cause of action
would supply a meaningful remedy against Cuban agencies
and instrumentalities. But applying the FSIA would
largely negate the cause of action. A plaintiff could not
readily satisfy the FSIA’s only potentially relevant
exceptions—the commercial activity or expropriation
exceptions—because those exceptions require direct effects
or commercial activity in the United States. And in light of
the Helms-Burton Act’s simultaneous embargo prohibiting
American commercial activity with Cuba, that showing
would be difficult if not impossible for a plaintiff to make.
Third, the Act provides that subject-matter jurisdiction for
Helms-Burton Act suits lies under the federal-question
statute (28 U. S. C. §1331) rather than under the FSIA
(§1330). The jurisdictional provision therefore reinforces
the conclusion that the FSIA does not apply to suits under
the Helms-Burton Act. Fourth, the Act grants the
President plenary power to suspend suits under the Act
when doing so is in America’s national security or foreign
policy interests. The President’s statutorily assigned
gatekeeping authority over suits against Cuban agencies
and instrumentalities tracks the pre-FSIA foreign
sovereign immunity regime rather than the FSIA’s
approach—yet another sign that the FSIA does not apply
here.
Cite as: 609 U. S. ____ (2026) 9
Opinion of the Court
In short, as we will now explain in more detail, the entire
architecture of the Helms-Burton Act establishes that the
Act waives the foreign sovereign immunity of Cuban
agencies and instrumentalities, and does not require Exxon
to also satisfy one of the FSIA’s exceptions to foreign
sovereign immunity.
1
A congressional waiver of sovereign immunity must be
“clearly discernible from the sum total” of Congress’s
“work.” Department of Agriculture Rural Development
Rural Housing Service v. Kirtz, 601 U. S. 42, 55 (2024)
(quotation marks omitted). In other words, Congress must
make its waiver “unmistakably clear in the language of the
statute.” Id., at 49 (quotation marks omitted). Under this
Court’s precedents, a statute creating a cause of action that
explicitly applies against a sovereign waives the immunity
of that sovereign, “even without a separate waiver
provision.” Id., at 53.
Here, the Helms-Burton Act’s cause of action expressly
applies against Cuban agencies and instrumentalities.
Specifically, §6082(a)(1)(A) explicitly confers a private right of action for any U. S. national whose “property” was
“confiscated by the Cuban Government.” The cause of
action runs against “any person that . . . traffics in” the
confiscated property. 22 U. S. C. §6082(a)(1)(A). As
relevant here, §6023(11) in turn defines “person” to include
“any agency or instrumentality of a foreign state.”
This Court’s general sovereign immunity precedents—
most recently Kirtz—hold that when, as here, Congress
creates a cause of action and expressly applies the cause of
action against government agencies or instrumentalities,
Congress has abrogated sovereign immunity. See 601
U. S., at 49–50; see also Kimel v. Florida Bd. of Regents, 528 U. S. 62, 73–74 (2000); Nevada Dept. of Human Resources
v. Hibbs, 538 U. S. 721, 726 (2003); Financial Oversight and
10 EXXON MOBIL CORP. v. CORPORACIÓN
CIMEX, S. A. (CUBA)
Opinion of the Court
Management Bd. for P. R. v. Centro De Periodismo
Investigativo, Inc., 598 U. S. 339, 347–348 (2023) (FOMB).
Here, like in Kirtz, the Helms-Burton Act “creates a cause
of action.” 601 U. S., at 49 (quotation marks omitted);
§6082(a)(1)(A). Check. And here, like in Kirtz, the HelmsBurton Act “explicitly authorizes suit against a government
on that claim” by defining “person” to include an “agency or
instrumentality of a foreign state.” 601 U. S., at 49.
(quotation marks omitted); §6023(11). Again, check.
But what about the FSIA? Must a plaintiff suing under
the Helms-Burton Act also satisfy one of the FSIA’s
enumerated exceptions to foreign sovereign immunity?
In the ordinary course, the FSIA applies when a plaintiff
seeks to sue a foreign sovereign under a general federal or
state cause of action. See, e.g., Argentine Republic v.
Amerada Hess Shipping Corp., 488 U. S. 428, 435–436, 438
(1989) (suit under the Alien Tort Statute must satisfy the
FSIA). In those circumstances, the FSIA’s default
presumption of immunity and its enumerated exceptions do
important work. After all, when Congress creates a general
cause of action, it is not evident that Congress contemplates
or intends that plaintiffs suing under that general cause of
action could hale foreign sovereigns into U. S. court. In
such a case, therefore, the FSIA governs which suits can go
forward against foreign sovereigns.
But the Helms-Burton Act is entirely different. Congress
took the highly unusual step of creating a cause of action
that expressly applies against foreign (here, Cuban)
agencies and instrumentalities. Only a few other laws in
the U. S. Code create a cause of action that expressly
applies against a foreign sovereign or its agencies and
instrumentalities. See Tr. of Oral Arg. 14–15 (referencing
the handful of statutes that authorize actions against
foreign agencies and instrumentalities); Pet. for Cert. 30;
cf., e.g., 22 U. S. C. §§8102(11), 8141–8142, 6701(6), 6726,
6761(a)(1)(A); 21 U. S. C. §§2312–2314.
Cite as: 609 U. S. ____ (2026) 11
Opinion of the Court
In short, the Helms-Burton Act’s uncommon cause of
action, with its explicit application against foreign agencies and instrumentalities, strongly indicates that the Act itself
waives the foreign sovereign immunity of Cuban agencies
and instrumentalities and that a plaintiff need not also
satisfy an FSIA exception.
But we need not rest on the cause of action alone because
several other features of the Helms-Burton Act confirm that
conclusion.
2
Congress does not ordinarily enact self-defeating
statutes. See Quarles v. United States, 587 U. S. 645, 654
(2019). And more specifically, Congress does not ordinarily
“authorize a suit against a sovereign with one hand, only to
bar it with the other.” FOMB, 598 U. S., at 348. But the
Cuban government defendants’ interpretation of the
Helms-Burton Act would do just that and largely negate the
Act’s cause of action.
That is because the defendants would require suits under
the Act to also satisfy an FSIA exception. In turn, the
potentially relevant FSIA exceptions would require a
plaintiff such as Exxon to demonstrate that the Cuban
instrumentalities engaged in commercial activity in the
United States or, as part of their commercial activity
elsewhere, committed acts that had direct effects in the
United States. See 28 U. S. C. §§1605(a)(2)–(3).
But a plaintiff suing under the Helms-Burton Act could
almost never meet those exceptions because the Act
simultaneously codified a comprehensive economic
embargo against Cuba and barred most commercial
interactions between Americans and Cubans. See 22
U. S. C. §6032(h); see, e.g., 31 CFR §§515.201(b), 515.204
(2025).
Requiring a plaintiff to satisfy an FSIA exception would
therefore eviscerate the cause of action. So it follows that
12 EXXON MOBIL CORP. v. CORPORACIÓN
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Opinion of the Court
requiring a plaintiff to satisfy an FSIA exception cannot be
the correct interpretation of the Helms-Burton Act. After
all, we know that Congress not only created an express
cause of action against Cuban agencies and
instrumentalities but also viewed the cause of action as a
powerful remedy: The Act contains numerous other Cubaspecific references that assume the existence of actual suits
and judgments against Cuban agencies and
instrumentalities. For instance, §6064(a) authorizes the
suspension of “actions” “filed against the Cuban
Government.” Section 6082(d) limits the enforceability of
“any judgment against an agency or instrumentality of the
Cuban Government” when there is a democratically elected
or transition government in Cuba. And §6082(a)(7)(B)
clarifies that “any claim against the Cuban Government” is
not subject to the Act’s embargo provisions.
A “claim” or “action” “filed against the Cuban
Government” anticipates plaintiffs suing Cuban agencies
and instrumentalities. §§6082(a)(7)(B), 6064(a). A
“judgment against an agency or instrumentality of the
Cuban Government” contemplates plaintiffs suing those
Cuban government entities and reaching a final
disposition—not having their suit dismissed on sovereign
immunity grounds. §6082(d). None of those references
would make any sense if the FSIA applied and suits under
the Helms-Burton Act could never (or almost never) make
it out of the starting blocks.1
1 The Cuban government defendants object that the embargo is not 100
percent airtight and that applying the FSIA to suits under the HelmsBurton Act would therefore not render the Act’s cause of action a dead letter. That argument is misplaced. It does nothing to rebut the point that a Congress embargoing nearly all American commercial activity with Cuba would not have made the new cause of action against Cuban agencies and instrumentalities depend on a commercial nexus between the United States and Cuba.
Cite as: 609 U. S. ____ (2026) 13
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It would be odd to read the Act as an empty threat against
Cuba given that Congress, in the text of the Act,
deliberately “endowed” U. S. nationals “with a judicial
remedy in the courts of the United States.” §6081(11). In
the Act, Congress repeatedly decried the unlawful taking
and continued exploitation of property by the Castro
regime. §§6081(2), (3), (5), (6). And Congress supplied U. S.
nationals with a cause of action because the “international
judicial system, as currently structured, lacks fully effective remedies for the wrongful confiscation of property and for
unjust enrichment from the use of wrongfully confiscated
property by governments.” §6081(8) (emphasis added).
As the U. S. Government aptly explained at oral
argument, applying the FSIA to suits under the HelmsBurton Act would create a “gross mismatch” because Cuban
agencies and instrumentalities were the Helms-Burton
Act’s “main culprits.” Tr. of Oral Arg. 39. It would make
little sense for Congress to construct an elaborate statute
authorizing suits against the Cuban government agencies
and instrumentalities if, because of the FSIA, almost no
suits could ever get through the courthouse door.
3
In addition to the Helms-Burton Act’s explicit cause of
action against Cuban agencies and instrumentalities, as
well as the fact that applying the FSIA to suits under the
Act would largely negate the express cause of action, the
Act provides that suits under the Act fall within the general
federal-question jurisdiction of 28 U. S. C. §1331.
Section 6082(c)(1) of Title 22 states: “Except as provided
in this subchapter,” Title 28’s provisions apply to suits
under the Act “to the same extent as . . . any other action
brought under section 1331 of title 28.” (emphasis added).
In other words, a suit under the Helms-Burton Act is the
same as “any other” federal-question suit under §1331. And
§1331 allows civil actions to proceed in federal court
14 EXXON MOBIL CORP. v. CORPORACIÓN
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Opinion of the Court
whenever they arise “under the Constitution, laws, or
treaties of the United States.”
Why does that matter? Because a suit under the FSIA is
not a federal-question suit. Suits subject to the FSIA are
governed by 28 U. S. C. §1330, which affords district courts
original jurisdiction over civil actions against foreign
states—provided that the suit qualifies under one of the
FSIA’s exceptions. So ordinarily, a federal district court
possesses jurisdiction over a suit against a foreign state,
agency, or instrumentality only if a plaintiff invokes an
FSIA exception. But §1331 contains no such threshold
requirement.
By making suits under the Helms-Burton Act subject to
§1331 rather than §1330, Congress made clear that actions
under the Helms-Burton Act are not actions under the
FSIA.
Moreover, it is not as if Congress, when enacting the
Helms-Burton Act, somehow forgot that the FSIA and
§1330 existed. The next provision of the Helms-Burton Act,
22 U. S. C. §6082(c)(2), borrows the FSIA’s rules as to the
method of serving process “on an agency or instrumentality
of a foreign state.” See also §§6023(1), (3) (borrowing
definitions from the FSIA). Those service-of-process rules
define when a court may exercise personal jurisdiction over
a foreign agency or instrumentality. See 28 U. S. C.
§1330(b). Congress’s selective and explicit incorporation of
the FSIA’s service-of-process provisions into the HelmsBurton Act reinforces the conclusion that the FSIA does not
generally apply to the Act. If the FSIA did apply, there
would have been no need for the service-of-process
provision in 22 U. S. C. §6082(c)(2). See 111 F. 4th, at 41
(Randolph, J., dissenting).
The Cuban government defendants respond that §6082(c)
is titled “[p]rocedural requirements”—not “jurisdictional
requirements.” But that observation does not change the
substance of §§6082(c)(1) and (c)(2): §6082(c)(1) addresses
Cite as: 609 U. S. ____ (2026) 15
Opinion of the Court
subject-matter jurisdiction, and §6082(c)(2) addresses
service-of-process rules for foreign agencies and
instrumentalities—that is, how to obtain personal
jurisdiction over those foreign government entities.
And more fundamentally, a contrary reading would read
“other” out of the statute because §6082(c)(1) says that a
suit under the Helms-Burton Act is the same as “any other”
federal-question suit under 28 U. S. C. §1331.2
So §§6082(c)(1) and (c)(2) are best read as addressing
subject-matter and personal jurisdiction in suits against
Cuban agencies and instrumentalities. Together,
§§6082(c)(1) and (c)(2) further confirm that suits under the
Helms-Burton Act are not governed by the FSIA.
4
And lest there be any remaining doubt, the HelmsBurton Act grants the President plenary power to suspend
suits under the Act based on current national security and
foreign policy assessments. The Presidential suspension
provisions operate similarly to how foreign sovereign
immunity operated in the years before the 1976 enactment
of the FSIA—that is, with foreign sovereign immunity
decisions the province of the Executive Branch.
Many provisions of the Helms-Burton Act authorize the
President to suspend or permit suits under the Act. Most
relevant is §6085(c)(1)(B), which empowers the President to
2 The dissent says that “Congress’s reference to §1331 makes perfect
sense” because most suits under the Helms-Burton Act will be brought against private parties, not Cuban agencies or instrumentalities. Post, at 10 (opinion of KAGAN, J.). That observation, however, does not explain §6082(c)(2)’s explicit borrowing of the FSIA’s service-of-process rules. If Congress was aware enough to provide service-of-process rules
applicable in the subset of suits against foreign agencies or
instrumentalities, why did Congress decline to make a similar
clarification in §6082(c)(1) with respect to subject-matter jurisdiction if it intended for suits against Cuban agencies and instrumentalities to fall under §1330 of the FSIA?
16 EXXON MOBIL CORP. v. CORPORACIÓN
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Opinion of the Court
“suspend the right to bring an action . . . with respect to
confiscated property” for six-month periods if the President
determines and reports that the “suspension is necessary to
the national interests of the United States and will expedite
a transition to democracy in Cuba.” Section 6085(c)(2)
authorizes additional six-month suspensions. Section
6064(a) likewise authorizes the President “to suspend the
right of action . . . with respect to actions thereafter filed against the Cuban Government.” And §6085(d) allows the
President to “rescind any suspension” in order to “expedite
a transition to democracy in Cuba.”
Therefore, suits under the Helms-Burton Act may
proceed only if the President chooses to allow them—or,
more precisely, not to disallow them. And the President’s
statutorily authorized discretion over whether to allow such
suits is constrained only by his obligation to determine and
report to Congress his conclusion that a suspension is in the
national interest and would further a democratic transition
in Cuba, or that a transition government has taken power.
See §§6064(a), 6082(d), (h)(1)(B), 6085(c)(1)(B).
The bottom line is that the Helms-Burton Act, with
respect to suits against Cuban agencies and
instrumentalities, establishes a version of the immunity
system in place before the FSIA. Recall that the old regime
of Executive Branch immunity decisionmaking essentially
allowed the State Department (under the direction of the
President) to make the immunity call. In 1976, the FSIA
then transferred “primary responsibility for deciding
‘claims of foreign states to immunity’ from the State
Department to the courts.” Samantar, 560 U. S., at 313
(quoting 28 U. S. C. §1602).
It is not plausible to conclude that Congress, in the
Helms-Burton Act, in essence reinstated the pre-FSIA
immunity regime while simultaneously subjecting suits
under the Act to the FSIA—particularly given that few if
any suits against Cuban agencies and instrumentalities
Cite as: 609 U. S. ____ (2026) 17
Opinion of the Court
could ever clear the FSIA’s hurdles. In other words, after
the President has determined that suits under the HelmsBurton Act should proceed, requiring those suits to satisfy
the FSIA—under which the suit would usually be
disallowed by federal judges—would badly undermine
Congress’s design and thwart the President’s statutorily
authorized assessment of current developments in Cuba.
What sense would that make? Why craft numerous
provisions granting gatekeeping power to the President if
very few (if any) suits would satisfy one of the FSIA’s
exceptions? Involving the President in such a manner
would make little sense unless (as is the case) Congress
displaced the FSIA for suits against Cuban agencies and
instrumentalities.
This Court’s precedents further support reading the
Helms-Burton Act to displace the FSIA’s immunity regime.
In Republic of Iraq v. Beaty, the relevant statute afforded
the President the power to “make inapplicable with respect
to Iraq . . . any other provision of law that applies to
countries that have supported terrorism.” 556 U. S. 848,
856 (2009) (quotation marks omitted). The statute in Beaty
did not speak explicitly to sovereign immunity, to suits
against foreign sovereigns, or to the FSIA. This Court
nonetheless concluded that the “any other provision of law”
residual clause authorized the President to suspend the
FSIA’s exception for state sponsors of terrorism, thereby
reinstating Iraq’s foreign sovereign immunity. See id., at
866. The Helms-Burton Act establishes a similar grant of
on-off authority over foreign sovereign immunity to the
President.3
3 The dissent points out that the Presidential suspension provisions
empower the President to stop all suits under the Helms-Burton Act— not just those against Cuban agencies or instrumentalities. See post, at 10. But the fact that the Act sweeps broader does not affect the critical point: As applied to suits against Cuban agencies and instrumentalities, 18 EXXON MOBIL CORP. v. CORPORACIÓN
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Opinion of the Court
To summarize: The Helms-Burton Act “afford[s] the
President”—not the courts—the “flexibility” to confront
“unique circumstances” that can arise in the foreign affairs
realm with respect to Cuba. Id., at 857. After the President
has allowed suits under the Act to go forward, there is no
additional FSIA hurdle that a plaintiff must clear in order
to sue Cuban agencies or instrumentalities.
* * *
The “sum total” of the Helms-Burton Act’s work clearly
abrogates the foreign sovereign immunity of Cuban
agencies and instrumentalities and displaces the FSIA’s
default sovereign immunity regime. Kirtz, 601 U. S., at 55.
The Helms-Burton Act authorizes private suits against
Cuban agencies and instrumentalities—suits that would
largely be nonstarters if subjected to the FSIA’s
requirements. 22 U. S. C. §§6082(a)(1)(A), 6023(11). The
Act expressly refers to claims, actions, and judgments
against the Cuban Government. §§6064(a), 6082(d),
(a)(7)(B). The Act treats suits under the Act as falling
within federal-question jurisdiction, unlike suits under the
FSIA. §6082(c)(1). And the Act expressly reinstates the
President as gatekeeper for those suits, akin to the preFSIA regime. §§6064(a), 6082(d), (h)(1)(B), 6085(b),
(c)(1)(B). 4
III
The Cuban government defendants offer a few
counterarguments.
First, they invoke the canon against implied repeal. They
say that the Helms-Burton Act can supersede the FSIA only
the suspension provisions authorize the President to make the de facto immunity determination.
4 This case does not present, and this opinion therefore does not
address, the question whether the Helms-Burton Act also abrogates the foreign sovereign immunity of other countries’ agencies or
instrumentalities.
Cite as: 609 U. S. ____ (2026) 19
Opinion of the Court
if the two Acts “ ‘irreconcilabl[y] conflict.’ ” Brief for
Respondents 20 (quoting Carcieri v. Salazar, 555 U. S. 379,
395 (2009)). And because some small subset of suits under
the Act might satisfy the FSIA’s exceptions, they claim that
there is no irreconcilable conflict.
But the implied-repeal canon does not apply here because
the Helms-Burton Act contains many express indications
that the Act is a standalone statutory exception to foreign
sovereign immunity. The Helms-Burton Act expressly
authorizes suits against Cuban agencies and
instrumentalities, expressly contemplates claims, actions,
and judgments against the Cuban government entities,
expressly identifies 28 U. S. C. §1331 (not §1330) as the
source of jurisdiction, and expressly grants the President
authority to suspend or permit suits under the Act
irrespective of whether those suits satisfy an FSIA
exception.
Second, the Cuban government defendants draw on
language from this Court’s precedents describing the FSIA
as the “sole basis for obtaining jurisdiction over a foreign
state in federal court.” Argentine Republic v. Amerada Hess
Shipping Corp., 488 U. S. 428, 439 (1989).
But as the Court later explained in another FSIA case,
“general language in judicial opinions” does not control
“quite different circumstances that the Court was not then
considering.” Turkiye Halk Bankasi A.S. v. United States,
598 U. S. 264, 278 (2023) (quotation marks omitted). More
to the point, the FSIA (and this Court’s descriptions of the
FSIA) could not and did not preclude Congress from
enacting a later exception to foreign sovereign immunity.
See Bank Markazi v. Peterson, 578 U. S. 212, 236 (2016).
And here, 22 U. S. C. §6082(c)(1) says that the FSIA is not
the basis of jurisdiction for suits under the Helms-Burton
Act—let alone the sole basis. Section 1331 of Title 28, the
general federal-question statute, is the source of
jurisdiction.
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Opinion of the Court
Third, the Cuban government defendants (and the
dissent) assert that Congress could have more clearly
displaced the FSIA if it wanted to do so. It is true that
Congress could have of course “address[ed] the question” of
foreign sovereign immunity “in different and arguably even
more obvious terms.” Department of Agriculture Rural
Development Rural Housing Service v. Kirtz, 601 U. S. 42,
51 (2024). But this Court’s precedents repeatedly
emphasize that Congress does not need to use “magic
words” to abrogate sovereign immunity. Id., at 48
(quotation marks omitted); see FAA v. Cooper, 566 U. S.
284, 291 (2012); Kimel v. Florida Bd. of Regents, 528 U. S.
62, 76 (2000); Lac du Flambeau Band of Lake Superior
Chippewa Indians v. Coughlin, 599 U. S. 382, 388 (2023).
Congress must simply make a waiver of sovereign
immunity “clearly discernable” from the “sum total” of its
work. Kirtz, 601 U. S., at 55 (quotation marks omitted).
The Helms-Burton Act did that here, through the many
provisions indicating that the Act waives the foreign
sovereign immunity of Cuban agencies and
instrumentalities.
The Cuban government defendants point out, however,
that the Helms-Burton Act directly amended the FSIA to
add an exception to its execution-immunity provisions,
which ensured execution immunity for foreign nations’
diplomatic property. See 110 Stat. 818. But execution and
jurisdictional immunity are separate concepts. See
Republic of Argentina v. NML Capital, Ltd., 573 U. S. 134,
142 (2014). So Congress’s choice to amend the FSIA’s
provisions on execution immunity tells us nothing about
whether Congress supplanted the FSIA with respect to
jurisdictional immunity.5
5 The Cuban government defendants (and the dissent) argue that the
Act’s execution-immunity provisions may still prevent Exxon from
Cite as: 609 U. S. ____ (2026) 21
Opinion of the Court
Fourth, the Cuban government defendants (and the
dissent) say that an earlier draft of the Helms-Burton Act
expressly waived sovereign immunity, whereas the final
version did not. See H. R. 927, 104th Cong., 1st Sess.,
§302(c) (Feb. 14, 1995); S. 381, 104th Cong., 1st Sess.,
§302(c) (Feb. 9, 1995). But that earlier version waived the
sovereign immunity of the foreign governments themselves.
See H. R. 927, §302(a)(1). After some objections, Congress
removed that provision and instead applied the cause of
action against foreign agencies and instrumentalities, and
not directly against the sovereigns. See H. R. 927, 104th
Cong., 1st Sess., §302(a)(1) (Aug. 4, 1995). And in any
event, that argument is simply another magic-words
requirement.
* * *
The Helms-Burton Act creates a private right of action
that expressly runs against Cuban agencies and
instrumentalities, expressly contemplates claims and
judgments against those entities, expressly identifies §1331
(not §1330) as the source of subject-matter jurisdiction for
suits under the Act, and expressly confers on the
President—not the courts—gatekeeping authority over
those suits. Here, acting pursuant to the Act, the President
has determined that permitting those suits will promote
U. S. foreign policy interests. Stacking an FSIA
ultimately recovering on a judgment. See post, at 8. But that is no reason to disregard the clear waiver of jurisdictional immunity contained in the Helms-Burton Act. As Exxon and the U. S. Government both persuasively explained, there can be real value in obtaining a judgment against a Cuban government defendant, even if a plaintiff is unable to immediately collect on that judgment. See Tr. Oral Arg. 100–101, 48– 49. For example, depending on future developments in the law or in Cuba, a plaintiff may be able to later collect on a judgment. Or a judgment (and others like it) may provide further leverage against Cuba and corresponding incentives for Cuba to democratize. Cf. Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae 24; 22 U. S. C. §6082(d).
22 EXXON MOBIL CORP. v. CORPORACIÓN
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Opinion of the Court
requirement on top of the Helms-Burton Act would thwart
Congress’s design and directly contravene the President’s
foreign policy judgments. We reverse the judgment of the
U. S. Court of Appeals for the D. C. Circuit and remand the
case for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
Cite as: 609 U. S. ____ (2026) 1
KAGAN, J., dissenting
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
No. 24–699
EXXON MOBIL CORPORATION, PETITIONER v.
CORPORACIÓN CIMEX, S. A. (CUBA), ET AL.
ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF
APPEALS FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT
[June 23, 2026]
JUSTICE KAGAN, with whom JUSTICE SOTOMAYOR and
JUSTICE JACKSON join, dissenting.
The Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976 (FSIA)
provides that foreign states and their instrumentalities
“shall be immune from the jurisdiction” of the federal courts
unless an FSIA exception is met. 28 U. S. C. §1604. The
FSIA is a comprehensive law, applying no matter the substantive law the plaintiff ’s claim invokes. The question
here is whether the defendants, Cuban-owned companies,
are immune from the jurisdiction of the federal courts. The
answer should be just what the FSIA says: It depends on
whether an FSIA exception is met. The Court instead concludes that the answer is no—not because of anything in
the FSIA, but on the ground that a different law, the HelmsBurton Act, abrogates (in nonlegal speak, eliminates) the
immunity that the FSIA may otherwise grant. The problem
for the majority is that the bar for finding congressional abrogation is high, and the Helms-Burton Act falls short. Because there is no abrogation in that Act—even in hiding, as
the majority finds—I respectfully dissent.
I
To litigate a claim against a sovereign defendant—
whether foreign (as here) or domestic—the plaintiff must
establish two things: a cause of action, and an abrogation of
2 EXXON MOBIL CORP. v. CORPORACIÓN
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KAGAN, J., dissenting
sovereign immunity. The two are “analytically distinct.”
FDIC v. Meyer, 510 U. S. 471, 484 (1994). A cause of action
exists if “the source of substantive law upon which the
claimant relies provides an avenue for relief.” Ibid. By contrast, the immunity inquiry turns on the state defendant’s
amenability to suit—that is, whether Congress has made
the defendant, even though sovereign, subject to the jurisdiction of the federal courts. The creation of a cause of action and the abrogation of immunity do not always travel
together: Rather, Congress can do one without doing the
other. For example, the FSIA’s exceptions generally abrogate immunity without supplying a cause of action; and
conversely, most statutory causes of action are subject to
the FSIA’s immunity rules. So Congress’s abrogation of a
defendant’s immunity does not, on its own, give a plaintiff
a cause of action against that defendant; and, critically
here, Congress’s creation of a cause of action does not,
standing alone, tell us whether Congress has abrogated immunity.
To do the latter, Congress must make its intent to abrogate “unmistakably clear in the language of the statute.”
Department of Agriculture Rural Development Rural Housing Service v. Kirtz, 601 U. S. 42, 49 (2024). That does not
mean Congress must use magic words saying that immunity is abrogated. Nor does it mean, as to a foreign defendant, that Congress must amend the FSIA directly. But an
abrogation of immunity must be “clearly discernible from
the sum total” of Congress’s work. Id., at 54–55. The standard is a “stringent” one. Financial Oversight and Management Bd. for P. R. v. Centro De Periodismo Investigativo,
Inc., 598 U. S. 339, 346 (2023) (FOMB). And that is especially so when dealing with foreign (as opposed to domestic)
immunity, because Congress enacted the FSIA specifically
to deal with immunity questions—to serve as “a comprehensive framework for resolving any claim of [foreign] sovereign immunity,” in general compliance with international
Cite as: 609 U. S. ____ (2026) 3
KAGAN, J., dissenting
law. Republic of Austria v. Altmann, 541 U. S. 677, 699
(2004); see Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela v. Helmerich
& Payne Int’l Drilling Co., 581 U. S. 170, 179 (2017).1
This case involves a suit brought under the Helms-Burton Act against Cuban-owned companies, and the question
is whether those defendants are immune from suit. All
agree that Helms-Burton supplies a cause of action. And
all agree that the FSIA grants the defendants presumptive
immunity from suit: They “shall be immune from the jurisdiction” of the federal courts unless an FSIA exception is
met. 28 U. S. C. §1604. But Exxon argues that the FSIA’s
strictures do not apply because Helms-Burton makes “unmistakably clear” an abrogation of the immunity that the
FSIA may otherwise grant the defendants. Kirtz, 601 U. S.,
at 49. The majority accepts that argument, but it is wrong.
The first clue that Helms-Burton does not abrogate sovereign immunity is the statute’s language—which says not
one word on the topic. The Act provides a cause of action,
stating that “any person” who “traffics in property which
was confiscated by the Cuban Government” “shall be liable
to any United States national who owns the claim to such
property.” 22 U. S. C. §6082(a)(1)(A). No mention of immunity there. The Act also defines the “person” trafficking
in property comprehensively, as “any person or entity, including any agency or instrumentality of a foreign state.”
§6023(11). No mention of immunity there either. That provision helps define the scope of the cause of action, but without saying whether a state defendant in a given case can
invoke immunity. In other words, the plain text of the Act
provides a “source of substantive law” under which a plaintiff can sue foreign instrumentalities. Meyer, 510 U. S., at
1 There is, by contrast, no “Domestic Sovereign Immunities Act”—i.e.,
no “comprehensive framework for resolving any claim of [domestic] sovereign immunity.” Altmann, 541 U. S., at 699. Rather, Congress has approached abrogation of domestic sovereign immunity on a statute-bystatute basis.
4 EXXON MOBIL CORP. v. CORPORACIÓN
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KAGAN, J., dissenting
484. But the Act says nothing about the “distinct” question
whether or when the immunity of those instrumentalities
is abrogated. Ibid.
The absence of that language, though not dispositive, is
telling because Helms-Burton did amend the FSIA as to a
different matter. The key background fact here is that the
FSIA grants foreign states and instrumentalities two kinds
of immunity: not just the immunity from suit (“jurisdictional” immunity) this case is about, but also “execution”
immunity, rendering the property of state defendants “immune from attachment[,] arrest[,] and execution” absent an
applicable exception. 28 U. S. C. §1609. And while leaving
untouched the FSIA’s jurisdictional-immunity provision,
Helms-Burton changed the FSIA’s execution-immunity
rule: “Notwithstanding the provisions of [the FSIA], the
property of a foreign state shall be immune from attachment and from execution in an action brought under
[Helms-Burton] to the extent that the property is a facility
or installation used by an accredited diplomatic mission for
official purposes.” §1611(c). The content of that amendment is not relevant to this case (though it may be of interest that the amendment expands, rather than contracts, a
sovereign’s execution immunity). Rather, the amendment
matters because it shows that Congress thought the FSIA
would otherwise apply to any Helms-Burton suit against a
sovereign defendant. Yet even so, Congress chose not to
change even a jot of the FSIA’s jurisdictional-immunity
rule. This Court often says that “[w]hen Congress amends
one statutory provision but not another,” we “presume[ ]” it
“acted intentionally.” Gross v. FBL Financial Services, Inc.,
557 U. S. 167, 174 (2009). Applied here, that principle requires the Court to respect Congress’s decision to leave the
FSIA’s jurisdictional-immunity provision alone.
What is more, Congress specifically considered amending
the FSIA to abrogate jurisdictional immunity—and elected
not to. The original version of the Helms-Burton Act would
Cite as: 609 U. S. ____ (2026) 5
KAGAN, J., dissenting
have amended the FSIA to except all actions brought under
the Act “with respect to confiscated property.” H. R. 927,
104th Cong., 1st Sess., §302(c) (1995); S. 381, 104th Cong.,
1st Sess., §302(c) (1995). But the Department of Justice objected that the proposed FSIA amendment would “represent[ ] a potentially sweeping extension of U. S. court jurisdiction over foreign sovereigns or their agencies and
instrumentalities,” not in keeping with “international practice.” App. to Brief for Corporación CIMEX 7a. So Congress
reconsidered, and enacted Helms-Burton without that
FSIA amendment. In short, Congress knew the FSIA
grants jurisdictional immunity (with certain exceptions) to
foreign instrumentalities; debated whether to abrogate that
immunity when the instrumentalities were sued under
Helms-Burton for trafficking in confiscated property; and
decided against taking that action.2
Even with all that, Exxon might have a good argument
under our precedents if it could show that Congress’s creation of a cause of action in Helms-Burton would be negated
absent an abrogation of immunity. The key decision, as is
evident in the majority opinion, is Department of Agriculture v. Kirtz. There, the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA)
supplied a cause of action against agencies of the Federal
Government. Because the FSIA does not have a domestic
equivalent—that is, a statute setting out a sovereign immunity framework with exceptions, see supra, at 3, n. 1—a
plaintiff could never have sued the Government under the
cause of action the FCRA gave unless that statute also
2 The majority waves away Congress’s choice to drop the FSIA amendment by noting that the original bills also provided that foreign states themselves could be sued. See ante, at 21. But that observation only underscores that Congress’s omission of the FSIA amendment was deliberate: Congress originally envisioned a cause of action with a more sweeping reach, and then pared it back—both by excluding foreign states from the set of potential defendants and by requiring plaintiffs to satisfy an FSIA exception in order to sue foreign instrumentalities.
6 EXXON MOBIL CORP. v. CORPORACIÓN
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KAGAN, J., dissenting
(implicitly) abrogated immunity. We therefore concluded
that the FCRA did so, lest its cause of action be “negat[ed].” Kirtz, 601 U. S., at 50. Absent such an abrogation, Congress would have “authorize[d] a suit against a sovereign
with one hand, only to bar it with the other.” Ante, at 11
(quoting FOMB, 598 U. S., at 348).
But that is not true here, because reading Helms-Burton
as it was written—that is, without an abrogation provision—does not “negate” the cause of action it authorized.
Kirtz, 601 U. S., at 50. The sovereign entities included
within Helms-Burton’s cause of action are not agencies of
the Federal Government, as in Kirtz, but foreign instrumentalities. And the FSIA sets out a “comprehensive
framework” listing the circumstances in which such an instrumentality is subject to suit. Altmann, 541 U. S., at 699.
So unlike in Kirtz, a plaintiff here may be able to use the
cause of action Congress provided without our reading an
abrogation of immunity into the substantive statute. In
other words, a plaintiff can sue a foreign instrumentality
under Helms-Burton even if that statute does not also abrogate immunity. All the plaintiff must do is establish that
an FSIA exception to immunity applies—which Exxon may
have accomplished in this very case.3
And even assuming most plaintiffs could not meet an
FSIA exception, the Helms-Burton cause of action still has
plenty of work to do in the statutory scheme. Recall that
the cause of action authorizes suit against “any person”—
3 The District Court found that one of the FSIA exceptions did apply;
on appeal, the D. C. Circuit remanded for further factfinding on that question. See 111 F. 4th 12, 32–37 (2024). I take no position on the District Court’s finding, but the majority is wrong to suggest that it must be in error given the embargo on Cuba. See ante, at 11–12. At the time Helms-Burton was passed, as now, the embargo permitted varied categories of commercial activity between United States nationals and Cuban instrumentalities. See 31 CFR §515.533 to §515.591 (2025). Those activities, in turn, could enable a Helms-Burton suit to meet one of the FSIA’s exceptions. See 28 U. S. C. §1605(a)(2).
Cite as: 609 U. S. ____ (2026) 7
KAGAN, J., dissenting
including a private individual or company—that traffics in
confiscated property. 22 U. S. C. §§6023(11), 6082(a)(1)(A);
see supra, at 3. That fact reveals that Cuban-owned companies were only part of a much broader class of defendants
subject to suit under Helms-Burton. And in a “findings”
section of the statute, Congress explained why—indeed, explained that the statute primarily targeted private investors. §6081. The Cuban regime, Congress there observed,
had sought to ease the financial strain of the embargo by
“offering foreign investors the opportunity” to profit from
property “confiscated from United States nationals.”
§6081(5). That private “ ‘trafficking’ in confiscated property,” Congress continued, “provide[d] badly needed financial benefit, including hard currency,” to the Cuban regime,
and thereby “undermine[d]” the embargo. §6081(6). So
Congress created the cause of action—principally, to “deter”
foreign investors from taking up Cuba’s offer to profit off of “Castro’s wrongful seizures.” §6081(11). No suit against a
Cuban-owned company is needed for that deterrence to
work. Rather, the cause of action can well achieve its primary goal when plaintiffs sue private parties—as in a case
this Court heard earlier this Term. See, e.g., Havana Docks
Corp. v. Royal Caribbean Cruises, Ltd., 608 U. S. ___ (2026).
All to say, we need not find an abrogation lurking between the lines in the Helms-Burton Act to render Congress’s work comprehensible. The statute is perfectly coherent as written. It enables plaintiffs to sue any private
parties that traffic in confiscated property. And it also enables plaintiffs to sue foreign instrumentalities when their
trafficking falls within an FSIA exception—meaning, that
their activity meets the conditions Congress has decided
should strip immunity from a sovereign. That construction
adheres to the text of both the Helms-Burton Act and the
FSIA, with no conflict between the two and no hidden abrogation.
8 EXXON MOBIL CORP. v. CORPORACIÓN
CIMEX, S. A. (CUBA)
KAGAN, J., dissenting
II
The majority’s first wrong turn is to reduce Kirtz to an
over-simplified formula: cause of action plus potential sovereign defendant (“check,” “check”) equals abrogation of
sovereign immunity. Ante, at 10. The Helms-Burton Act
creates a cause of action and defines the potential defendants to include foreign instrumentalities. Ergo, the HelmsBurton Act abrogates those instrumentalities’ immunity—
or so goes the majority’s logic. But as discussed earlier,
Kirtz required more. See supra, at 5–6. It required that the
cause of action provided against sovereign defendants be inexplicable absent an abrogation—that Congress would
have provided the action only to take it away. See 601 U. S.,
at 50–51; see also FOMB, 598 U. S., at 348 (“The very suits
allowed against governments would automatically have
been dismissed”). In fact, the majority appears to recognize
its argument’s inadequacy, because it reserves the question
whether Helms-Burton abrogates the immunity of nonCuban foreign instrumentalities. See ante, at 18, n. 4. If
the majority’s check-check equation really were valid, there
would be no question to reserve. Helms-Burton, after all,
gives the same cause of action against non-Cuban foreign
instrumentalities as it does against Cuban ones.
The majority next insists that its reading is necessary to
guarantee victims of confiscation “fully effective remedies,”
ante, at 13 (emphasis in original)—which sounds good, but
turns out to be a hollow promise. The majority’s thinking
is that if the FSIA’s jurisdictional-immunity provision applies, only a few suits would “make it out of the starting
blocks” (because only a few would satisfy the FSIA’s exceptions). Ante, at 12. But the added suits that will “make it
out” under the majority’s view will still falter before the finish line. That is because, as noted earlier, the FSIA makes
the property of foreign states immune from execution to satisfy a judgment, unless certain exceptions apply. See supra,
at 4. Although Exxon contests that those executionCite as: 609 U. S. ____ (2026) 9
KAGAN, J., dissenting
immunity provisions govern here, see Brief for Exxon 48,
the majority does not, see ante, at 20–21, and n. 5. So under
its view, even a plaintiff who obtains a judgment against a
Cuban-owned company faces a problem: He will never get
his judgment enforced—never collect any money for it—unless one of the FSIA’s execution-immunity exceptions is satisfied. And the plaintiff will not satisfy one of those exceptions if he does not satisfy an FSIA exception to bring suit
in the first place. The upshot is that the majority’s “fully
effective remedies” are not remotely so: In fact, it turns out that they are no better than the ones available under my
construction.4
The majority turns third to procedure, but with no
greater success. The Act, it observes, provides that certain
procedural provisions and rules apply as they would in “any
other action brought under section 1331 of title 28”—i.e.,
the general federal-question statute. §6082(c)(1); see ante,
at 13. Because suits subject to the FSIA are brought under
§1330 rather than §1331, the majority infers that HelmsBurton suits against foreign sovereigns cannot be subject to
the FSIA. See ante, at 13–14. But that inference just reveals the majority’s tunnel-vision perspective on HelmsBurton’s coverage. Contrary to what the majority seems to
think, most Helms-Burton suits are brought against private parties, not Cuban instrumentalities. So most of those
4 The majority’s response is that there is “value in obtaining a judgment against a Cuban government defendant” even if there is no apparent path to converting it into money. Ante, at 20–21, n. 5. But exactly what value? The majority seems to rely mainly on a contingency—that the laws on execution immunity could change some fine day. The majority also suggests that obtaining a judgment against a Cuban instrumentality will pressure Cuba to democratize, though why a judgment that is unenforceable—so has no monetary consequence—would have that effect is left unexplained. In any event, neither account of the supposed value of an unenforceable judgment can come close to justifying the extravagant claim that the majority’s approach will provide Helms-Burton plaintiffs with “fully effective remedies.” Ante, at 13 (emphasis in original). 10 EXXON MOBIL CORP. v. CORPORACIÓN
CIMEX, S. A. (CUBA)
KAGAN, J., dissenting
suits will be brought under §1331, not §1330 (even presuming the FSIA applies to the sovereign defendants occasionally sued). For that reason, Congress’s reference to §1331
makes perfect sense, and does not “read ‘other’ out of the
statute.” Ante, at 15. Because most Helms-Burton suits are
§1331 suits, Congress naturally provided that the procedural rules applicable in “other” §1331 suits should apply.
I see nothing to suggest an abrogation of immunity in that
provision, much less an “unmistakably clear” one. Kirtz,
601 U. S., at 49.
Finally, the majority puts undue weight on a provision
allowing the President to suspend Helms-Burton suits. See
22 U. S. C. §6085(c). As the majority sees it, that provision
was designed to restore the pre-FSIA regime in which
courts deferred to Executive Branch determinations about
sovereign immunity. See ante, at 5–6, 15–17. Of course,
Congress could have done something like that, by amending
the FSIA itself or stating in Helms-Burton that the FSIA
does not apply there. But the suspension provision is not a
good fit for that result. Once again, the suits brought under
that Act are mostly against private parties. The suspension
provision enables the President to stop all of those suits, in addition to the ones against Cuban instrumentalities. So
contra the majority, that provision is not reasonably understood to have as its object the alteration of the usual rules
of sovereign immunity.
* * *
Nothing in the text or “architecture” (ante, at 9) of the
Helms-Burton Act suggests that Congress abrogated the
sovereign immunity of these defendants—much less that it
did so with the requisite unmistakable clarity. And nothing
in this case presents a choice between giving effect to the
Helms-Burton Act and preserving the immunity codified in
the FSIA. So I would apply both laws as Congress wrote
them. That means, as the lower courts here held, that
Cite as: 609 U. S. ____ (2026) 11
KAGAN, J., dissenting
Exxon’s suit can proceed if—but only if—it can show an
FSIA exception is satisfied.