The unsigned, one-sentence opinion contained no explanation and said the case was “dismissed as improvidently granted.”
It means Facebook will have to face a class action lawsuit over accusations it misled investors about the Cambridge Analytica data scandal.
The scandal stemmed from the company using data from tens of millions of unwitting Facebook users to support the 2016 presidential campaigns of Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and then-candidate Donald Trump.
The lawsuit concerns a 2016 securities filing from Facebook acknowledging that improper third-party use of its data could harm the business.
The filing framed that risk as hypothetical, and the shareholders argue it improperly led them to believe that no such incident had occurred.
After an intermediate appeals court allowed the case to move forward, the Supreme Court agreed in June to hear the case and held oral arguments earlier this month.
At the arguments, the justices appeared split on whether to back Facebook’s appeal as they peppered both sides with hypotheticals that stretched from meteor strikes to Molotov cocktails.
Andy Stone, a spokesperson for Facebook parent Meta, dismissed the investors’ claims as “baseless” and said the company will “continue to defend ourselves” in district court.
“We are disappointed in the Supreme Court’s decision not to clarify this part of the law,” Stone said in a statement.
The Hill’s Zach Schonfeld has more here.
