Supreme Court Denies Verizon Bid to Pursue Refund on FCC Fine
The wireless carriers are each seeking refunds on a combined $200 million in penalties
WASHINGTON, Aug. 17, 2026 – The Supreme Court Monday denied Verizon’s request to pursue a $47 million refund in court.
The court issued a determination that it would not alter a June 4 decision in a way that Verizon said would have allowed it to recoup money it feels was tricked into paying by the Federal Communications Commission.
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The company paid that money in fines after the FCC found it didn’t adequately vet third parties before selling customer location data through 2018. The agency fined the other two national carriers for the same practice, with combined penalties totaling nearly $200 million.
The companies appealed, arguing that the FCC lacked the power to issue fines at all under recent Supreme Court precedent that said a jury trial had to be provided before fines could be issued.
The Supreme Court upheld the agency’s fining powers, but said the initial forfeiture orders were not mandatory, and money didn’t have to change hands until the Justice Department sued a fined entity to collect.
That, Verizon argued in a June 29 filing, was not how companies had understood FCC fines previously.
The company said it simply would have refused to pay $47 million if it felt there would be no consequences for doing so; the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit has typically required payment before companies could appeal a penalty, but the Supreme Court said it wasn’t clear that was necessary.
The Supreme Court decision simply affirmed a ruling of the Second Circuit, which had heard Verizon’s challenge and also found the FCC could issue fines.
That means the case won’t be sent back down, and Verizon won’t have a chance to argue that it should be refunded for paying a fine it didn’t know was voluntary.
The companies’ attorney, former Acting Solicitor General Jeff Wall, said they should get a refund during oral arguments, but Chief Justice John Roberts didn’t grant one.
“The carriers also argue that the specific forfeiture orders in this case misled them into paying, and that a refund is therefore appropriate,” he wrote. “We express no view on the merits of this argument, what relief may be available to the carriers, or in what proceeding.”
Asked whether the company felt it had other avenues to pursue a refund, Verizon declined to comment.
AT&T and T-Mobile are also seeking refunds.
That will be easier for AT&T, since the Supreme Court reversed a decision from the Fifth Circuit, which had sided with the company, and sent the case back down.
T-Mobile is in a similar situation to Verizon: the high court also simply affirmed the D.C. Circuit’s ruling siding against the company.
T-Mobile’s request for a rehearing is still pending before the justices. In addition to the refund issue, the company also wants to litigate other questions that weren’t addressed in the opinion, like whether FCC rules extend to the location data issue, and whether FCC fines should be capped.
The Trump administration has indicated it will submit a response to T-Mobile’s request, which it did not do in Verizon’s case. The DOJ asked the Supreme Court to extend its deadline for a response through Sept. 25, a request justices granted.
While the Supreme Court said FCC fines were nonbinding, the alternative was eliminating its fining authority altogether, something the agency told the court would have left many of its consumer protection rules with little to no enforcement mechanism at all.
It’s also not clear how frequently companies will elect to go the route of nonpayment going forward, telecom attorneys said in June. The DOJ is likely to back the FCC up in cases of big fines, and it can be difficult to stare down a regulator that controls the lifeblood of one’s business, they said.
