The First Circuit on July 24, 2026, affirmed the dismissal of a Puerto Rico public employee's First Amendment challenge to union dues withholding, ruling that the case was moot because the union had already stopped the disputed deductions and deposited with the court the full amount it had taken from his pay.
The decision turned on a basic limit on the reach of the federal courts, which resolve live disputes but not cases in which the plaintiff has already been given everything he asked for. Chief Judge Barron wrote for a unanimous panel that also included Circuit Judges Thompson and Gelpí.
Reynaldo Cruz, a former member of the Unión Independiente Auténtica de los Empleados de la Autoridad de Acueductos y Alcantarillados, known as UIA, sued the union, his employer, the Puerto Rico Aqueduct and Sewer Authority, or PRASA, and the Governor of Puerto Rico in her official capacity. Cruz objected to the withholding from his pay of union dues used for "political, ideological, and other nonbargaining expenditures," and he argued that the deductions, together with the Puerto Rico law and collective bargaining agreement authorizing them, violated the First Amendment. His complaint sought "declaratory and injunctive relief," along with "restitution, compensatory and nominal damages," costs, and attorneys' fees.
The events that mooted the case unfolded while the suit was pending. After the U.S. Supreme Court decided Janus v. American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees in 2018, PRASA stopped deducting union fees from Cruz's pay, citing an opinion letter from the Puerto Rico Secretary of Justice that concluded unauthorized deductions were unconstitutional under Janus. UIA, for its part, moved under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 67 to deposit with the district court the full amount of compensatory damages Cruz sought, plus interest and nominal damages, and it did so after the court directed that the funds be "unconditionally tendered."
The U.S. District Court for the District of Puerto Rico then dismissed all of Cruz's claims as moot. It reasoned that his request for declaratory relief was moot because the challenged conduct had ceased and that his damages claims were moot because UIA had deposited the money he sought. When Cruz asked the court to amend the judgment and enter a declaratory ruling on the merits, the court refused, explaining that UIA had "deposited the money that [Cruz] requested."
Cruz appealed, and in a 2025 decision the First Circuit rejected most of his arguments, including what it called his "lead argument" that he could not reach the deposited funds without a declaratory judgment in his favor. The court noted, though, that Cruz had also argued that his declaratory claim was not moot because, absent a ruling that his First Amendment rights had been violated, he might be unable to recover "prevailing party" attorneys' fees under Sections 1983 and 1988 of Title 42. Because the district court had not addressed that point, the panel remanded for it to be considered and kept jurisdiction over the appeal.
On remand, the district court found that Cruz had not waived the prevailing-party issue and that he did qualify as a prevailing party against UIA. It held, however, that the prevailing-party question had no bearing on whether the case was moot, relying on the "well-settled" rule that a litigant's interest in recovering attorney's fees does not by itself create the kind of stake in the outcome needed to revive an otherwise moot controversy.
Back before the First Circuit, every party agreed in supplemental briefing that the dismissal should stand. Because all sides accepted that the prevailing-party issue did not affect mootness and that Cruz's claims were therefore moot, the panel affirmed. It declined to reach other disputes the parties raised, including whether the district court's prevailing-party finding was correct and whether the suit should be dismissed against particular defendants, saying those matters fell "beyond the bounds of the initial appeal" and that it would "leave them to another day should they come before us."
The ruling ends Cruz's constitutional challenge without any decision on the merits. He remains entitled to the funds UIA placed with the court, which cover the dues and fees taken from his wages plus interest and nominal damages, but he wins no declaratory judgment that his rights were violated, and the panel left open whether his status as a prevailing party will ultimately support an award of attorneys' fees.