Texas Business Court Decision – June 9, 2026
No. 25-BC01A-0040 Southwest Airline Pilots Association v. The Boeing Company (First Div., Judge Bouressa) 2026 Tex. Bus. 37
Fraud/Misrepresentations – 737 Litigation.
Background. Plaintiff Southwest Airlines Pilot Association (SWAPA) sued Boeing, alleging Boeing made misrepresentations to SWAPA and its pilot members in connection with negotiations over SWAPA’s collective bargaining agreement with Southwest Airlines. SWAPA alleged that Boeing made false and misleading statements – both affirmative and by omission – directly to SWAPA and its members regarding the safety and characteristics of the Boeing 737 MAX aircraft, inducing SWAPA to include the MAX as a term in its 2016 CBA despite SWAPA’s initial reluctance to do so. SWAPA also alleged that Boeing concealed material differences between the 737 NG and the 737 MAC aircraft and continued a pattern of misrepresentations even after the 2018 Lion Air Flight 610 crash. SWAPA filed two underlying petitions, one in 2019 and the other in 2021, which were consolidated before the case was removed to the Business Court, and the court construes the petitions together.
Boeing moved for summary judgment on the pleadings, arguing SWAPA could not establish proximate cause as a matter of law because the alleged harm is too attenuated from the alleged wrongful conduct to satisfy either the “substantial factor” prong of the cause-in-fact standard or the foreseeability element. The motion is denied without prejudice.
Issue: Whether Boeing established, as a matter of law on the pleadings, that SWAPA cannot establish proximate causation between Boeing’s alleged misrepresentations and SWAPA’s claimed injuries, thereby warranting summary judgment.
Discussion.
(1) Under Texas’s fair notice pleading standard – which is materially more permissive that the federal pleading standards applicable in the Illinois cases Boeing relies on – a movant seeking judgment on the pleadings bears a high burden, and the movant must generally be afforded an opportunity to cure pleading deficiencies before an adverse judgment may be entered. The court distinguishes the two Northern District of Illinois cases Boeing relies on – Christensen v. Boeing Co., 2021 WL 83548 (Jan. 11, 2021) and In re Boeing 737 MAX Pilots Litigation, 638 F.Supp.3d 838 (N.D. Ill. 2022) – on grounds of differing pleading standards and material factual differences.
(2) Unlike the plaintiffs in those two cases, SWAPA does not simply seek damages flowing from the fleet grounding and aircraft design defects, but rather alleges that Boeing’s direct misrepresentations to SWAPA and its members induced them to execute a disadvantageous CBA to fly the MAX – a theory the Texas Supreme Court has already characterized as SWAPA’s core claim – see Boeing Co. v. Sw Airlines Pilots Ass’n, 716 S.W.3d 140, 150-151 (Tex. 2025).
(3) While some of the damage allegations in SWAPA’s pleadings may be infirm under proximate causation principles, SWAPA is entitled to replead to cure the deficiencies, and SWAPA is ordered to file its amended pleading no later than June 19, 2026.