Michigan lawmakers are in “Legislative Limbo” according to the latest Legislative HeatCheck report released today by the American Tort Reform Association as lawmakers weigh a bill that aims to fix the state’s premises liability rules, which were expanded by a Michigan Supreme Court ruling three years ago.
“Michigan is dealing with a real crisis in its courts when it comes to premises liability,” said Lauren Sheets Jarrell, ATRA’s vice president and counsel for civil justice policy. “Every trip-and-fall case takes longer and costs more to resolve under the current rules, even the minor ones. The legislature has a bill on the table that would fix it, but it’s critical to get it to the governor’s desk before the state’s legal climate gets even worse.”
The Michigan Supreme Court eliminated the state’s decades-old “open-and-obvious” rule in a July 2023 decision, landing the court on the American Tort Reform Foundation’s Judicial Hellholes® list for the first time. That rule had let judges throw out weak slip-and-fall lawsuits early, for hazards, like ice or a pothole, that any careful visitor would have seen and avoided.
Without the “open-and-obvious” rule, even the most obvious hazard can now drag a property owner through a full trial. The Michigan Supreme Court remains on the Judicial Hellholes® Watch List while it considers two more cases that ATRA says could push premises liability even further.
House Bill 4582 would restore the open-and-obvious rule and create a clear, two-part test for premises liability: a property owner is responsible only if a hazard poses a genuinely unreasonable risk and the owner knew or should have known about it. The House passed the bill in March, but it’s been pending in the Senate Finance, Insurance and Consumer Protection Committee since then.
“Store owners and small businesses end up paying through higher insurance premiums, and some businesses settle claims they’d otherwise win because fighting costs more than paying,” Sheets Jarrell said.
Recent data shows that excessive litigation costs Michigan families nearly $4,590 a year in a “tort tax” for a family of four, or $1,148 per person — enough to cover nearly three years of the average Michigander’s monthly car insurance bill, according to ATRA’s report. Excessive tort costs also contribute to the loss of 98,404 jobs and $11.6 billion in economic output statewide each year, along with $595.4 million in lost state government revenue.
Michigan lands in “Legislative Limbo” — a category formerly known as the “Heat Watch,” where Michigan also landed in 2025 — alongside California, New York and Ohio in the 2026 Legislative HeatCheck. The full report is available at heatcheck.atra.org.
