Yes. A federal court can pause a TCPA lawsuit while an appeal in a different case decides a legal question that controls it, under a power the Supreme Court described in Landis v. North American Co. The defendant asking for the pause has to show real hardship from going forward, and the stay can’t run without limits. When the pending appeal could end the case outright, a stay can spare a business months of class discovery and the settlement pressure that comes with it.
What is a Landis stay?
It’s a federal court’s discretionary power to put its own case on hold while another proceeding decides an issue that matters to it.
The Supreme Court explained in Landis v. North American Co., 299 U.S. 248 (1936), that “the power to stay proceedings is incidental to the power inherent in every court to control the disposition of the causes on its docket with economy of time and effort for itself, for counsel, and for litigants.” No statute or rule is needed, because the power comes from the court’s ordinary authority to manage the cases on its own calendar.
The same opinion set the burden. The Court wrote that “the suppliant for a stay must make out a clear case of hardship or inequity in being required to go forward, if there is even a fair possibility that the stay for which he prays will work damage to some one else.” It also warned in Landis that a stay is “immoderate and hence unlawful unless so framed in its inception that its force will be spent within reasonable limits.”
That’s the whole test in two sentences. A defendant must show why going forward hurts, and the stay must have an end in sight.
How do courts in the Ninth Circuit decide these motions?
They balance the harm a stay could cause the plaintiff against the hardship of going forward and the time a stay could save.
The leading Ninth Circuit case is Lockyer v. Mirant Corp., 398 F.3d 1098 (9th Cir. 2005). It applied factors first set out in an earlier Ninth Circuit case called CMAX. The first is “the possible damage which may result from the granting of a stay.” The second is the hardship a party may suffer from having to go forward. The last asks whether a stay would simplify or complicate the case.
Lockyer also held that “being required to defend a suit, without more,” isn’t enough hardship. A TCPA defendant can’t win a stay just by pointing to the cost of litigation. The motion needs a reason the other appeal will change this case.
The most useful part of Lockyer for TCPA defendants is how it described the earlier CMAX plaintiff, which won no reprieve from the stay. CMAX “sought only damages.” The court added that “It alleged no continuing harm and sought no injunctive or declaratory relief.” For that kind of plaintiff, a stay meant only “a delay in its monetary recovery.”
Most TCPA plaintiffs look like CMAX, because what they want is statutory damages for calls or texts that already happened, and money owed for past conduct can wait for an appellate answer without much harm to anyone. Many complaints also ask for an injunction, but that request is weak if the calls have stopped and the number sits on the company’s internal do-not-call list. The firm’s earlier post on stays pending an FCC ruling covers the related primary jurisdiction doctrine.
What did courts do with the text message appeal?
Two Indiana federal judges paused text message cases while the Seventh Circuit decided whether a text counts as a call, and the appeal came back faster than either expected.
In Richards v. Fashion Nova, LLC, the defendant asked the Southern District of Indiana to stay a Do Not Call text case while the Seventh Circuit heard an appeal in a separate case against Blackstone Medical Services. The plaintiff argued for a preliminary-injunction style test. The court rejected that in a footnote to its October 24, 2025 order, explaining that “the relevant appeal is in a separate action and Defendant seeks a stay of this case to conserve resources pending resolution of a threshold legal issue, not to enjoin an order entered in this case.”
Evidence preservation mattered. The Fashion Nova order notes that the defendant “confirmed that it and its third-party text vendor have placed legal holds on relevant data for this action.” That answered the plaintiff’s worry that records would disappear during a pause. The court still worried about timing, writing that “the Seventh Circuit could take years to resolve the relevant legal question,” and it stayed the case pending its own ruling on the defendant’s motion to dismiss, which raised the same issue.
Two weeks later, in Richards v. Shein Distribution Corp., a second judge in the same district followed that analysis. The November 4, 2025 order pointed to the Seventh Circuit appeal and the pending motion to dismiss, “either of which could bring this litigation to an end.” The judge granted the stay even though, in the order’s words, “the undersigned typically prefers to avoid staying cases.”
The appeal didn’t take years. The Seventh Circuit heard argument on May 21, 2026 and decided Steidinger v. Blackstone Medical Services, No. 25-2398 on July 14, 2026, less than nine months after the Fashion Nova order. The court held that “texts are not calls” under § 227(c)(5), so the private Do Not Call claim didn’t reach them. That ruling binds courts in the Seventh Circuit only.
Which kinds of stay requests are there?
| What the defendant asks for | What the court weighs | Where it came up |
|---|---|---|
| Stay pending another case’s appeal | The CMAX factors as applied in Lockyer | Fashion Nova and Shein motions, 2025 |
| Stay pending the court’s own ruling on a motion to dismiss | Prejudice to the plaintiff against the simplification a ruling could bring | Fashion Nova and Shein orders, 2025 |
| Stay of an order in the defendant’s own case while it appeals | A test that mirrors a preliminary injunction | Fashion Nova order, footnote 2 |
When is a Landis stay worth asking for?
It’s worth asking for when the other appeal presents a pure legal question that could end every claim in the case, and it’s rarely worth the fight when the appeal would only trim one theory.
The Indiana cases worked because the complaints pleaded one claim built only on texts. A ruling that texts aren’t calls would leave nothing. Compare a complaint that pleads prerecorded voice calls alongside the texts, or a robocall count alongside a Do Not Call count. There, the other appeal can’t end the case, and a judge will see the stay as delay. Plaintiffs know this, which is why many TCPA complaints now plead every theory the facts allow.
Timing matters just as much, because once months of document production and depositions are behind the parties, a judge will be slow to call a halt and let that work sit while another court takes its time. A stay motion filed in the first weeks of a case fits the Indiana pattern, where little if any discovery had taken place. A motion filed after class discovery is underway asks the court to waste work already done, and it rarely succeeds.
There’s also a practical point that courts don’t always spell out. A defendant that proposes its own end point does better than one that asks for an open-ended pause. Ask for a stay through the appellate decision, with joint status reports at set intervals and a promise to file a notice within days of the ruling. That answers the Landis concern about stays that run past reasonable limits before the plaintiff raises it.
The fallback is often the better request. Both Indiana judges declined to wait on the Seventh Circuit and instead stayed the case pending their own ruling on a motion to dismiss raising the same question. A defendant that files the dispositive motion first and the stay motion second gives the court an easy middle option.
If the court refuses a stay, the legal argument doesn’t go away. The defense keeps it for the motion to dismiss and, later, for a Rule 23(f) petition if a class is certified.
What should a company do before asking for a stay?
Get the record in order so the court has no reason to fear lost evidence, and so the plaintiff can’t claim ongoing harm. The firm’s TCPA litigation defense page describes how these motions fit into an early defense plan.
- Put a litigation hold on call and text logs, and get written confirmation that the dialing or texting vendor has done the same.
- Export opt-out and internal do-not-call records, and confirm the plaintiff’s number is on the internal list so no further contact goes out.
- Pull the National Do Not Call Registry scrub records and the Registry version dates used for each campaign at issue.
- Gather the vendor contracts along with the scripts or message files that went to the plaintiff’s number.
- Talk to a lawyer before you respond to the complaint or contact the plaintiff, and before any offer goes out.
Steps 1 and 2 do double duty, since they protect the company against a spoliation claim later and they’re also the facts that carried the prejudice factor for the defendant in Fashion Nova. A defendant that can’t say its vendor’s data is on hold is asking the judge to take a risk with the plaintiff’s evidence.
Questions about stays pending another court’s appeal
Does filing a stay motion pause the case automatically?
No. Deadlines keep running until the judge grants the motion. A defendant that files a stay motion still has to answer or move to dismiss on time and meet any discovery dates already set. Many defendants ask the court to hear the stay motion and the motion to dismiss together, so the judge can decide the cheaper question first without forcing early discovery.
Can a plaintiff defeat a stay by arguing that evidence will be lost?
It can try, and the argument works when the defendant hasn’t preserved its data. In Fashion Nova, the court found no undue prejudice, noting that the defendant and its texting vendor had placed legal holds and that the case was in its infancy. A company that documents its hold early takes this argument off the table.
How long can a Landis stay last?
There’s no fixed limit, but the Supreme Court said a stay must be framed so its force is spent within reasonable limits. Courts usually tie the stay to a specific appellate decision and require status reports. A request with no end point invites denial, so the motion should name the appeal, its stage, and when a decision is expected.
What happens if the other appeal goes against the defense?
The stay lifts and the case resumes where it stopped. The defendant has lost some time, and the plaintiff may point to the delay later, but the defense hasn’t waived anything. That’s why the stay motion should rest on a question that could end the case, so the upside justifies the risk of waiting.
Waiting on an appeal that could end your case
If your company is defending TCPA claims that depend on a legal question another court is about to decide, a well-timed stay motion can hold off class discovery until the answer comes in. Rosenberger + Kawabata represents businesses defending TCPA lawsuits and class actions through its business litigation practice, including claims involving marketing texts to numbers on the Do Not Call Registry. Contact Rosenberger + Kawabata online for a confidential consultation, or call (310) 894-6921.
Sources
The Supreme Court decision is Landis v. North American Co., 299 U.S. 248 (1936). The Ninth Circuit decision is Lockyer v. Mirant Corp., 398 F.3d 1098 (9th Cir. 2005). The Indiana orders are Richards v. Fashion Nova, LLC, No. 1:25-cv-01145, Dkt. 35 (S.D. Ind. Oct. 24, 2025) and Richards v. Shein Distribution Corp., No. 1:25-cv-01385, Dkt. 32 (S.D. Ind. Nov. 4, 2025). The Seventh Circuit decision is Steidinger v. Blackstone Medical Services, No. 25-2398 (7th Cir. July 14, 2026).
This post is general information about the Telephone Consumer Protection Act and related laws as of October 13, 2026. It is not legal advice, and reading it does not create an attorney-client relationship. Courts and the FCC change the rules in this area often, and the outcome of any claim depends on its facts. Past results do not guarantee future outcomes.