On November 22, 2016, in Wright Transportation, Inc. v. Pilot Corp., the US Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit held that CAFA jurisdiction vests at the time of filing and, therefore, a district court retains jurisdiction over state law claims properly pled under CAFA, even if the class claims are later dismissed ( (11th Cir. Nov. 22, 2016)).

In 2013, Wright Transportation (Wright), an Alabama corporation, filed a putative class action against Pilot Corp. (Pilot), in the US District Court for the Southern District of Alabama (S.D. Ala.), alleging that Pilot breached fuel-discount contracts it had with Wright and other customers. Wright alleged eight claims, six of which were state law claims. All of the claims were properly pled under the Class Action Fairness Act of 2005 (CAFA).

In January 2014, the district court dismissed Wright's federal and state class claims because, while Wright's case was pending in the S.D. Ala., the US District Court for the District of Arkansas approved a class action settlement against Pilot that deprived Wright of its standing to pursue its class claims. The S.D. Ala. also dismissed Wright's individual federal claims for failure to plead with sufficient particularity under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure (FRCP) 9(b), leaving Wright with only individual state law claims for breach of contract and unjust enrichment.

In April 2014, the US District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky consolidated Wright's action and six other lawsuits against Pilot into a multi-district litigation (MDL). In July 2015, the MDL Court found new information on the citizenship of one member of Pilot's LLC, which would deprive the court of diversity jurisdiction if Wright remained a party. Pilot urged the MDL Court to retain jurisdiction over Wright's action because Wright originally pleaded CAFA claims. The MDL Court declined and remanded the case to the S.D. Ala. without ruling on CAFA jurisdiction.

On remand, Wright moved to dismiss its two remaining claims without prejudice, intending to re-file in Alabama state court. Pilot opposed the motion, arguing that the S.D. Ala. had original jurisdiction under CAFA and, therefore, had supplemental jurisdiction over the remaining state law claims. The S.D. Ala. disagreed with Pilot and granted Wright's motion, ruling that:

It had discretion to decline to exercise supplemental jurisdiction once the CAFA claims were dismissed.

There was no compelling argument for the S.D. Ala. to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over the remaining state law claims.

Pilot appealed.

On appeal, the Eleventh Circuit held that the S.D. Ala. erred when it granted Wright's motion to dismiss. CAFA vested the district court with original subject matter jurisdiction over all of Wright's claims at the time the complaint was filed. The Eleventh Circuit reasoned that CAFA jurisdiction is analogous to conventional diversity jurisdiction, which vests at the time of filing and can only be lost by discovery that the parties were not actually diverse when the complaint was filed; post-filing changes to citizenship cannot destroy diversity.

Here, Wright originally filed in federal court under CAFA and did not argue or otherwise show that the original complaint was frivolous or deficient under CAFA. CAFA conferred original federal court jurisdiction over the state law claims, which was not lost even though later events meant there would be no class. Accordingly, the Eleventh Circuit reversed and remanded for further proceedings.