WASHINGTON — The United States Supreme Court will hear oral arguments on Monday, November 9, 2026, in Leonard W. Hoffman v. WBI Energy Transmission, Inc. (Case No. 25-159), a North Dakota property-rights case that asks a question affecting pipeline projects across the country: in a private condemnation under the Natural Gas Act, should just compensation be determined by reference to state law?

At the centre of the case is a group of ranchers in McKenzie County, in western North Dakota, led by Leonard Hoffman. A federal district court awarded them $383,375.76 in attorney's fees and litigation costs after they fought WBI Energy Transmission over the price of a pipeline easement across their ranchland. The US Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit then overturned that award in March 2025, holding that federal law — not North Dakota law — governs compensation in such cases. The ranchers challenged that ruling, and the Supreme Court agreed on June 26, 2026, to take the case.

Source: Dorsey & Whitney LLP analysis

How the dispute began: a 2018 pipeline through Bakken ranchland

The dispute began in 2018. In February that year, WBI Energy Transmission received federal certificate authorization to construct and operate approximately 12 miles of 24-inch-diameter pipeline through ranch land in western North Dakota, in the heart of the oil- and gas-producing Bakken formation of the Williston Basin. The new line was to run parallel to an existing WBI pipeline on the ranchers' land, carrying gas from the Wild Basin and Garden Creek processing plants to an interconnection with Northern Border Pipeline Company.

WBI and the ranchers could not agree on an easement price. According to the legal analysis of the case record, the ranchers had recently negotiated easement prices with oil pipelines — which do not have eminent-domain rights and must pay market prices — and sought a similar deal. WBI instead offered only what it had paid for the parallel natural-gas line easement years earlier. WBI then filed a complaint in federal district court to take a permanent easement and temporary rights-of-way by eminent domain, and, with the ranchers' agreement, the court allowed WBI immediate use and possession of the easements for construction, leaving the amount of compensation for trial.

Three years of litigation, a settlement on price — and a fight over fees

The two sides disagreed about what 'just compensation' means. WBI argued compensation should be set solely by the 'before and after rule' — the difference between the land's market value without the easement and its value burdened with it. The ranchers argued that other evidence, such as the market rates oil pipelines had paid for easements on the properties, should also count. After the trial judge refused to exclude that evidence, the parties reached a confidential settlement on the value of the easement itself, with the ranchers reserving their right to seek attorney fees and WBI reserving its right to contest them.

After three years of litigation, the ranchers sought $383,375.76 — $332,274.96 in legal fees and $50,650.86 in costs and expenses. WBI argued the amount was unreasonable and should be limited to $220,625.52. The district court, noting that the Natural Gas Act is silent on compensation, applied the Supreme Court's 1979 Kimbell Foods framework to ask whether state law could fill the gap, and concluded North Dakota condemnation law allowed the award of fees and costs. WBI appealed.

Source: Dorsey & Whitney LLP analysis

The Eighth Circuit said no — and split from four other circuits

The Eighth Circuit reversed. It held that 'just compensation' under the Fifth Amendment has a well-established meaning — the market value of the property taken, its 'full monetary equivalent' — and that the focus is always on the value of the property itself, not on what the owner spends resisting the taking. Under the Fifth Amendment, the court said, owners cannot recover 'indirect costs' such as attorney fees, and only a statute can require more. Because the Natural Gas Act says nothing about the measure of compensation — it does not even use the words 'just compensation' — the default Fifth Amendment rule applies. The court acknowledged that different concerns arise when a private company, rather than the United States, does the condemning, but called those 'policy arguments better addressed to Congress.'

Four other federal circuit courts have gone the other way, applying the Kimbell Foods framework to allow attorney fees and costs under state law in Natural Gas Act condemnations. Those courts have reasoned that a private company pursuing a condemnation for profit is not in the same position as the sovereign, and that state law does not frustrate the federal program. Resolving that split is why the Supreme Court took the case: attorneys general of ten states and a national network of eminent-domain and property lawyers supported the ranchers' petition, and the Solicitor General urged the Court to grant it and uphold the Eighth Circuit.

The arguments the justices will hear on November 9

Represented by the Institute for Justice, the ranchers argue in their merits brief that the Natural Gas Act does not explicitly override state property law. Their case rests on statutory interpretation: Section 7(h) of the Act, they say, grants a limited delegation of power to take property through a condemnation lawsuit whose purpose is to adjudicate how much must be paid — not a direct import of the Fifth Amendment minimum. They argue that real-property law lies at the core of traditional state authority, that North Dakota's rule is that property owners cannot be made to bear the cost of their own condemnation, and that if Congress had expected state courts to look to some source other than ordinary state property law, it would have left a hint in the text. Six amicus groups support the ranchers, including Florida property owners who point to the Sabal Trail pipeline in Florida, where, they say, a landowner initially offered $6,800 later won a jury determination of $463,439 — a gap they say shows why owners forced to litigate should not also have to absorb their legal costs. Property lawyers argue that affirming the Eighth Circuit would strip owners of state-law protections in 21 states.

Source: George Washington Law Review, November Sitting previews

WBI argues the opposite: that when a private company is delegated federal eminent-domain power, it stands in the position of the federal government, and the Fifth Amendment standard — which does not include attorney fees — applies. WBI points out that Congress knows how to choose state law when it wants to: one year before enacting Section 7(h), the General Bridge Act of 1946 expressly required compensation for bridge condemnations to be 'ascertained and paid according to the laws of the State.' WBI also warns that the ranchers' approach would create a patchwork of state compensation laws, undermining Congress's purpose of eliminating state-by-state variation so interstate pipelines can be built efficiently. The United States government has filed a brief supporting WBI's position, arguing that when Congress delegates federal eminent-domain power without expressly adopting state compensation rules, the Fifth Amendment standard applies and attorney's fees are not recoverable. Three amicus briefs support WBI, including trade associations that say FERC-certificated pipeline projects use eminent domain only as a last resort — citing a survey in which only about 10 percent of tracts on recent long pipeline projects required condemnation.

For Punjabi and other immigrant landowners and farmers in the United States — including families who have bought farmland and ranchland in states such as California, Washington and North Dakota — the case is a practical one: it decides who pays when a federally authorized pipeline crosses private land and the owner believes the offer is too low. Energy and trucking readers should also note the setting: McKenzie County sits in the Bakken, one of America's biggest oil-producing regions, where pipeline easements decide how crude and gas move to market.

What happens next

The justices will hear one round of oral argument on Monday, November 9, 2026. No decision will be announced that day; a ruling is expected later in the Court's current term, which typically runs into the following summer. Whatever the Court decides, analysts note that Congress could afterwards amend the Natural Gas Act to set its own compensation rule. Until the ruling lands, the $383,375.76 award in this case remains overturned, and the ranchers — who already settled the price of the easement itself — wait to learn whether the cost of defending their land will be repaid or remain theirs alone.