ASHCROFT, FORMER ATTORNEY GENERAL, et al. v. IQBAL et al.

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662 OCTOBER TERM, 2008
Syllabus
ASHCROFT, FORMER ATTORNEY GENERAL, et al.
v. IQBAL et al.
certiorari to the united states court of appeals for
the second circuit
No. 07–1015. Argued December 10, 2008—Decided May 18, 2009
Following the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, respondent Iqbal, a
Pakistani Muslim, was arrested on criminal charges and detained by
federal officials under restrictive conditions. Iqbal filed a Bivens action
against numerous federal officials, including petitioner Ashcroft, the for
mer Attorney General, and petitioner Mueller, the Director of the Fed
eral Bureau of Investigation (FBI). See Bivens v. Six Unknown Fed.
Narcotics Agents, 403 U. S. 388. The complaint alleged, inter alia, that
petitioners designated Iqbal a person “of high interest” on account of
his race, religion, or national origin, in contravention of the First and
Fifth Amendments; that the FBI, under Mueller’s direction, arrested
and detained thousands of Arab Muslim men as part of its September
11 investigation; that petitioners knew of, condoned, and willfully and
maliciously agreed to subject Iqbal to harsh conditions of confinement
as a matter of policy, solely on account of the prohibited factors and for
no legitimate penological interest; and that Ashcroft was the policy’s
“principal architect” and Mueller was “instrumental” in its adoption and
execution. After the District Court denied petitioners’ motion to dis
miss on qualified-immunity grounds, they invoked the collateral-order
doctrine to file an interlocutory appeal in the Second Circuit. Affirm
ing, that court assumed without discussion that it had jurisdiction and
focused on the standard set forth in Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly,
550 U. S. 544, for evaluating whether a complaint is sufficient to survive
a motion to dismiss. Concluding that Twombly’s “flexible plausibility
standard” obliging a pleader to amplify a claim with factual allegations
where necessary to render it plausible was inapplicable in the context
of petitioners’ appeal, the court held that Iqbal’s complaint was adequate
to allege petitioners’ personal involvement in discriminatory decisions
which, if true, violated clearly established constitutional law.
Held:
1. The Second Circuit had subject-matter jurisdiction to affirm the
District Court’s order denying petitioners’ motion to dismiss.
Pp. 671–675.
(a) Denial of a qualified-immunity claim can fall within the narrow
class of prejudgment orders reviewable under the collateral-order doc

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trine so long as the order “turns on an issue of law.” Mitchell v. For
syth, 472 U. S. 511, 530. The doctrine’s applicability in this context is
well established; an order rejecting qualified immunity at the motion
to-dismiss stage is a “final decision” under 28 U. S. C. § 1291, which
vests courts of appeals with “jurisdiction of appeals from all final de
cisions of the district courts.” Behrens v. Pelletier, 516 U. S. 299, 307.
Pp. 671–672.
(b) Under these principles, the Court of Appeals had, and this
Court has, jurisdiction over the District Court’s order. Because the
order turned on an issue of law and rejected the qualified-immunity
defense, it was a final decision “subject to immediate appeal.” Behrens,
supra, at 307. Pp. 672–675.
2. Iqbal’s complaint fails to plead sufficient facts to state a claim for
purposeful and unlawful discrimination. Pp. 675–687.
(a) This Court assumes, without deciding, that Iqbal’s First Amend
ment claim is actionable in a Bivens action, see Hartman v. Moore, 547
U. S. 250, 254, n. 2. Because vicarious liability is inapplicable to Bivens
and § 1983 suits, see, e. g., Monell v. New York City Dept. of Social
Servs., 436 U. S. 658, 691, the plaintiff in a suit such as the present one
must plead that each Government-official defendant, through his own
individual actions, has violated the Constitution. Purposeful discrim
ination requires more than “intent as volition or intent as aware
ness of consequences”; it involves a decisionmaker’s undertaking a
course of action “ ‘because of,’ not merely ‘in spite of,’ [the action’s] ad
verse effects upon an identifiable group.” Personnel Administrator of
Mass. v. Feeney, 442 U. S. 256, 279. Iqbal must plead sufficient factual
matter to show that petitioners adopted and implemented the detention
policies at issue not for a neutral, investigative reason, but for the pur
pose of discriminating on account of race, religion, or national origin.
Pp. 675–677.
(b) Under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 8(a)(2), a complaint must
contain a “short and plain statement of the claim showing that the
pleader is entitled to relief.” “[D]etailed factual allegations” are not
required, Twombly, 550 U. S., at 555, but the Rule does call for suffi
cient factual matter, accepted as true, to “state a claim to relief that is
plausible on its face,” id., at 570. A claim has facial plausibility when
the pleaded factual content allows the court to draw the reasonable in
ference that the defendant is liable for the misconduct alleged. Id., at
556. Two working principles underlie Twombly. First, the tenet that
a court must accept a complaint’s allegations as true is inapplicable to
threadbare recitals of a cause of action’s elements, supported by mere
conclusory statements. Id., at 555. Second, determining whether
a complaint states a plausible claim is context specific, requiring the

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reviewing court to draw on its experience and common sense. Id., at
556. A court considering a motion to dismiss may begin by identifying
allegations that, because they are mere conclusions, are not entitled to
the assumption of truth. While legal conclusions can provide the com
plaint’s framework, they must be supported by factual allegations.
When there are well-pleaded factual allegations, a court should assume
their veracity and then determine whether they plausibly give rise to
an entitlement to relief. Pp. 677–680.
(c) Iqbal’s pleadings do not comply with Rule 8 under Twombly.
Several of his allegations—that petitioners agreed to subject him to
harsh conditions as a matter of policy, solely on account of discriminatory
factors and for no legitimate penological interest; that Ashcroft was that
policy’s “principal architect”; and that Mueller was “instrumental” in its
adoption and execution—are conclusory and not entitled to be assumed
true. Moreover, the factual allegations that the FBI, under Mueller,
arrested and detained thousands of Arab Muslim men, and that he and
Ashcroft approved the detention policy, do not plausibly suggest that
petitioners purposefully discriminated on prohibited grounds. Given
that the September 11 attacks were perpetrated by Arab Muslims, it is
not surprising that a legitimate policy directing law enforcement to ar
rest and detain individuals because of their suspected link to the attacks
would produce a disparate, incidental impact on Arab Muslims, even
though the policy’s purpose was to target neither Arabs nor Muslims.
Even if the complaint’s well-pleaded facts gave rise to a plausible infer
ence that Iqbal’s arrest was the result of unconstitutional discrimina
tion, that inference alone would not entitle him to relief: His claims
against petitioners rest solely on their ostensible policy of holding de
tainees categorized as “of high interest,” but the complaint does not
contain facts plausibly showing that their policy was based on discrimi
natory factors. Pp. 680–684.
(d) Three of Iqbal’s arguments are rejected. Pp. 684–687.
(i) His claim that Twombly should be limited to its antitrust con
text is not supported by that case or the Federal Rules. Because
Twombly interpreted and applied Rule 8, which in turn governs the
pleading standard “in all civil actions,” Rule 1, the case applies to anti
trust and discrimination suits alike, see 550 U. S., at 555–556, and n. 3.
P. 684.
(ii) Rule 8’s pleading requirements need not be relaxed based on
the Second Circuit’s instruction that the District Court cabin discovery
to preserve petitioners’ qualified-immunity defense in anticipation of a
summary judgment motion. The question presented by a motion to
dismiss for insufficient pleadings does not turn on the controls placed on
the discovery process. Twombly, supra, at 559. And because Iqbal’s

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complaint is deficient under Rule 8, he is not entitled to discovery, cab
ined or otherwise. Pp. 684–686.
(iii) Rule 9(b)—which requires particularity when pleading “fraud
or mistake” but allows “other conditions of a person’s mind [to] be al
leged generally”—does not require courts to credit a complaint’s conclu
sory statements without reference to its factual context. Rule 9 merely
excuses a party from pleading discriminatory intent under an elevated
pleading standard. It does not give him license to evade Rule 8’s less
rigid, though still operative, strictures. Pp. 686–687.
(e) The Second Circuit should decide in the first instance whether
to remand to the District Court to allow Iqbal to seek leave to amend
his deficient complaint. P. 687.
490 F. 3d 143, reversed and remanded.
Kennedy, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Roberts,
C. J., and Scalia, Thomas, and Alito, JJ., joined. Souter, J., filed a
dissenting opinion, in which Stevens, Ginsburg, and Breyer, JJ.,
joined, post, p. 687. Breyer, J., filed a dissenting opinion, post, p. 699.
Former Solicitor General Garre argued the cause for peti
tioners. With him on the briefs were Assistant Attorney
General Katsas, Deputy Assistant Attorney General Cohn,
Curtis E. Gannon, Barbara L. Herwig, and Robert M. Loeb.
Michael L. Martinez, David E. Bell, and Matthew F. Scar
lato filed briefs for Dennis Hasty as respondent under this
Court’s Rule 12.6 urging reversal. Brett M. Schuman,
Lauren J. Resnick, and Thomas D. Warren filed briefs for
Michael Rolince et al. as respondents under this Court’s Rule
12.6 urging reversal.
Alexander A. Reinert argued the cause for respondents.
With him on the brief for respondent Javaid Iqbal were Joan
M. Magoolaghan, Elizabeth L. Koob, and Rima J. Oken.*
*Daniel J. Popeo, Richard A. Samp, and Paul J. Larkin, Jr., filed a
brief for William P. Barr et al. as amici curiae urging reversal.
Briefs of amici curiae urging affirmance were filed for the American
Association for Justice by Stephen B. Pershing and Les Weisbrod; for the
Japanese American Citizens League et al. by John E. Higgins; for Na
tional Civil Rights Organizations by Harold Hongju Koh and Cristo´bal
Joshua Alex; for Professors of Civil Procedure and Federal Practice by
Allan Ides and David L. Shapiro; for the Sikh Coalition et al. by Brian
E. Robinson; and for Ibrahim Turkmen et al. by Michael Winger.

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666 ASHCROFT v. IQBAL
Opinion of the Court
Justice Kennedy delivered the opinion of the Court.
Javaid Iqbal (hereinafter respondent) is a citizen of Paki
stan and a Muslim. In the wake of the September 11, 2001,
terrorist attacks he was arrested in the United States on
criminal charges and detained by federal officials. Respond
ent claims he was deprived of various constitutional protec
tions while in federal custody. To redress the alleged depri
vations, respondent filed a complaint against numerous
federal officials, including John Ashcroft, the former Attor
ney General of the United States, and Robert Mueller, the
Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).
Ashcroft and Mueller are the petitioners in the case now
before us. As to these two petitioners, the complaint al
leges that they adopted an unconstitutional policy that sub
jected respondent to harsh conditions of confinement on ac
count of his race, religion, or national origin.
In the District Court petitioners raised the defense of
qualified immunity and moved to dismiss the suit, contending
the complaint was not sufficient to state a claim against
them. The District Court denied the motion to dismiss, con
cluding the complaint was sufficient to state a claim despite
petitioners’ official status at the times in question. Petition
ers brought an interlocutory appeal in the Court of Appeals
for the Second Circuit. The court, without discussion, as
sumed it had jurisdiction over the order denying the motion
to dismiss; and it affirmed the District Court’s decision.
Respondent’s account of his prison ordeal could, if proved,
demonstrate unconstitutional misconduct by some govern
mental actors. But the allegations and pleadings with re
spect to these actors are not before us here. This case in
stead turns on a narrower question: Did respondent, as the
plaintiff in the District Court, plead factual matter that, if
taken as true, states a claim that petitioners deprived him
of his clearly established constitutional rights. We hold re
spondent’s pleadings are insufficient.

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I
Following the 2001 attacks, the FBI and other entities
within the Department of Justice began an investigation of
vast reach to identify the assailants and prevent them from
attacking anew. The FBI dedicated more than 4,000 special
agents and 3,000 support personnel to the endeavor. By
September 18 “the FBI had received more than 96,000 tips
or potential leads from the public.” Dept. of Justice, Office
of Inspector General, The September 11 Detainees: A Re
view of the Treatment of Aliens Held on Immigration
Charges in Connection with the Investigation of the Septem
ber 11 Attacks 1, 11–12 (Apr. 2003), http://www.usdoj.gov/oig/
special/0306/full.pdf ?bcsi_scan_61073EC0F74759AD=0&
bcsi_scan_filename=full.pdf (as visited May 14, 2009, and
available in Clerk of Court’s case file).
In the ensuing months the FBI questioned more than 1,000
people with suspected links to the attacks in particular or to
terrorism in general. Id., at 1. Of those individuals, some
762 were held on immigration charges; and a 184-member
subset of that group was deemed to be “of ‘high interest’ ” to
the investigation. Id., at 111. The high-interest detainees
were held under restrictive conditions designed to prevent
them from communicating with the general prison population
or the outside world. Id., at 112–113.
Respondent was one of the detainees. According to his
complaint, in November 2001 agents of the FBI and Immi
gration and Naturalization Service arrested him on charges
of fraud in relation to identification documents and conspir
acy to defraud the United States. Iqbal v. Hasty, 490 F. 3d
143, 147–148 (CA2 2007). Pending trial for those crimes, re
spondent was housed at the Metropolitan Detention Center
(MDC) in Brooklyn, New York. Respondent was designated
a person “of high interest” to the September 11 investigation
and in January 2002 was placed in a section of the MDC
known as the Administrative Maximum Special Housing Unit

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(ADMAX SHU). Id., at 148. As the facility’s name indi
cates, the ADMAX SHU incorporates the maximum security
conditions allowable under Federal Bureau of Prisons regu
lations. Ibid. ADMAX SHU detainees were kept in lock
down 23 hours a day, spending the remaining hour outside
their cells in handcuffs and leg irons accompanied by a four
officer escort. Ibid.
Respondent pleaded guilty to the criminal charges, served
a term of imprisonment, and was removed to his native Paki
stan. Id., at 149. He then filed a Bivens action in the
United States District Court for the Eastern District of New
York against 34 current and former federal officials and 19
“John Doe” federal corrections officers. See Bivens v. Six
Unknown Fed. Narcotics Agents, 403 U. S. 388 (1971). The
defendants range from the correctional officers who had
day-to-day contact with respondent during the term of his
confinement, to the wardens of the MDC facility, all the way
to petitioners—officials who were at the highest level of the
federal law enforcement hierarchy. First Amended Com
plaint in No. 04–CV–1809 (JG)(JA), ¶¶ 10–11, App. to Pet. for
Cert. 157a (hereinafter Complaint).
The 21-cause-of-action complaint does not challenge re
spondent’s arrest or his confinement in the MDC’s general
prison population. Rather, it concentrates on his treatment
while confined to the ADMAX SHU. The complaint sets
forth various claims against defendants who are not before
us. For instance, the complaint alleges that respondent’s
jailors “kicked him in the stomach, punched him in the face,
and dragged him across” his cell without justification, id.,
¶ 113, at 176a; subjected him to serial strip and body-cavity
searches when he posed no safety risk to himself or others,
id., ¶¶ 143–145, at 182a; and refused to let him and other
Muslims pray because there would be “[n]o prayers for ter
rorists,” id., ¶ 154, at 184a.
The allegations against petitioners are the only ones rele
vant here. The complaint contends that petitioners desig

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nated respondent a person of high interest on account of his
race, religion, or national origin, in contravention of the First
and Fifth Amendments to the Constitution. The complaint
alleges that “the [FBI], under the direction of Defendant
MUELLER, arrested and detained thousands of Arab Mus
lim men . . . as part of its investigation of the events of Sep
tember 11.” Id., ¶ 47, at 164a. It further alleges that “[t]he
policy of holding post-September-11th detainees in highly re
strictive conditions of confinement until they were ‘cleared’
by the FBI was approved by Defendants ASHCROFT and
MUELLER in discussions in the weeks after September 11,
2001.” Id., ¶ 69, at 168a. Lastly, the complaint posits that
petitioners “each knew of, condoned, and willfully and mali
ciously agreed to subject” respondent to harsh conditions of
confinement “as a matter of policy, solely on account of [his]
religion, race, and/or national origin and for no legitimate
penological interest.” Id., ¶ 96, at 172a–173a. The pleading
names Ashcroft as the “principal architect” of the policy, id.,
¶ 10, at 157a, and identifies Mueller as “instrumental in [its]
adoption, promulgation, and implementation,” id., ¶ 11, at
157a.
Petitioners moved to dismiss the complaint for failure to
state sufficient allegations to show their own involvement in
clearly established unconstitutional conduct. The District
Court denied their motion. Accepting all of the allegations
in respondent’s complaint as true, the court held that “it can
not be said that there [is] no set of facts on which [respond
ent] would be entitled to relief as against” petitioners. Id.,
at 136a–137a (relying on Conley v. Gibson, 355 U. S. 41
(1957)). Invoking the collateral-order doctrine petitioners
filed an interlocutory appeal in the United States Court of
Appeals for the Second Circuit. While that appeal was
pending, this Court decided Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly,
550 U. S. 544 (2007), which discussed the standard for evalu
ating whether a complaint is sufficient to survive a motion
to dismiss.

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The Court of Appeals considered Twombly’s applicability
to this case. Acknowledging that Twombly retired the Con
ley no-set-of-facts test relied upon by the District Court, the
Court of Appeals’ opinion discussed at length how to apply
this Court’s “standard for assessing the adequacy of plead
ings.” 490 F. 3d, at 155. It concluded that Twombly called
for a “flexible ‘plausibility standard,’ which obliges a pleader
to amplify a claim with some factual allegations in those con
texts where such amplification is needed to render the claim
plausible.” Id., at 157–158. The court found that petition
ers’ appeal did not present one of “those contexts” requiring
amplification. As a consequence, it held respondent’s plead
ing adequate to allege petitioners’ personal involvement in
discriminatory decisions which, if true, violated clearly es
tablished constitutional law. Id., at 174.
Judge Cabranes concurred. He agreed that the majority’s
“discussion of the relevant pleading standards reflect[ed] the
uneasy compromise . . . between a qualified immunity privi
lege rooted in the need to preserve the effectiveness of gov
ernment as contemplated by our constitutional structure and
the pleading requirements of Rule 8(a) of the Federal Rules
of Civil Procedure.” Id., at 178 (internal quotation marks
and citations omitted). Judge Cabranes nonetheless ex
pressed concern at the prospect of subjecting high-ranking
Government officials—entitled to assert the defense of quali
fied immunity and charged with responding to “a national
and international security emergency unprecedented in the
history of the American Republic”—to the burdens of discov
ery on the basis of a complaint as nonspecific as respondent’s.
Id., at 179. Reluctant to vindicate that concern as a member
of the Court of Appeals, ibid., Judge Cabranes urged this
Court to address the appropriate pleading standard “at the
earliest opportunity,” id., at 178. We granted certiorari, 554
U. S. 902 (2008), and now reverse.

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Opinion of the Court
II
We first address whether the Court of Appeals had
subject-matter jurisdiction to affirm the District Court’s
order denying petitioners’ motion to dismiss. Respondent
disputed subject-matter jurisdiction in the Court of Appeals,
but the court hardly discussed the issue. We are not free to
pretermit the question. Subject-matter jurisdiction cannot
be forfeited or waived and should be considered when fairly
in doubt. Arbaugh v. Y & H Corp., 546 U. S. 500, 514 (2006)
(citing United States v. Cotton, 535 U. S. 625, 630 (2002)).
According to respondent, the District Court’s order denying
petitioners’ motion to dismiss is not appealable under the
collateral-order doctrine. We disagree.
A
With exceptions inapplicable here, Congress has vested
the courts of appeals with “jurisdiction of appeals from all
final decisions of the district courts of the United States.”
28 U. S. C. § 1291. Though the statute’s finality requirement
ensures that “interlocutory appeals—appeals before the end
of district court proceedings—are the exception, not the
rule,” Johnson v. Jones, 515 U. S. 304, 309 (1995), it does not
prevent “review of all prejudgment orders,” Behrens v. Pel
letier, 516 U. S. 299, 305 (1996). Under the collateral-order
doctrine a limited set of district-court orders are
reviewable “though short of final judgment.” Ibid. The
orders within this narrow category “are immediately appeal
able because they ‘finally determine claims of right separable
from, and collateral to, rights asserted in the action, too im
portant to be denied review and too independent of the cause
itself to require that appellate consideration be deferred until
the whole case is adjudicated.’ ” Ibid. (quoting Cohen v.
Beneficial Industrial Loan Corp., 337 U. S. 541, 546 (1949)).
A district-court decision denying a Government officer’s
claim of qualified immunity can fall within the narrow class

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of appealable orders despite “the absence of a final judg
ment.” Mitchell v. Forsyth, 472 U. S. 511, 530 (1985). This
is so because qualified immunity—which shields Government
officials “from liability for civil damages insofar as their con
duct does not violate clearly established statutory or consti
tutional rights,” Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U. S. 800, 818
(1982)—is both a defense to liability and a limited “entitle
ment not to stand trial or face the other burdens of litiga
tion.” Mitchell, 472 U. S., at 526. Provided it “turns on
an issue of law,” id., at 530, a district-court order denying
qualified immunity “ ‘conclusively determine[s]’ ” that the de
fendant must bear the burdens of discovery; is “conceptually
distinct from the merits of the plaintiff ’s claim”; and would
prove “effectively unreviewable on appeal from a final judg
ment,” id., at 527–528 (citing Cohen, supra, at 546). As a
general matter, the collateral-order doctrine may have ex
panded beyond the limits dictated by its internal logic and
the strict application of the criteria set out in Cohen. But
the applicability of the doctrine in the context of qualified
immunity claims is well established; and this Court has been
careful to say that a district court’s order rejecting qualified
immunity at the motion-to-dismiss stage of a proceeding is a
“final decision” within the meaning of § 1291. Behrens, 516
U. S., at 307.
B
Applying these principles, we conclude that the Court of
Appeals had jurisdiction to hear petitioners’ appeal. The
District Court’s order denying petitioners’ motion to dismiss
turned on an issue of law and rejected the defense of quali
fied immunity. It was therefore a final decision “subject to
immediate appeal.” Ibid. Respondent says that “a quali
fied immunity appeal based solely on the complaint’s failure
to state a claim, and not on the ultimate issues relevant to
the qualified immunity defense itself, is not a proper subject
of interlocutory jurisdiction.” Brief for Respondent Iqbal
15 (hereinafter Iqbal Brief). In other words, respondent

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contends the Court of Appeals had jurisdiction to determine
whether his complaint avers a clearly established constitu
tional violation but that it lacked jurisdiction to pass on the
sufficiency of his pleadings. Our opinions, however, make
clear that appellate jurisdiction is not so strictly confined.
In Hartman v. Moore, 547 U. S. 250 (2006), the Court re
viewed an interlocutory decision denying qualified im
munity. The legal issue decided in Hartman concerned the
elements a plaintiff “must plead and prove in order to win”
a First Amendment retaliation claim. Id., at 257, n. 5.
Similarly, two Terms ago in Wilkie v. Robbins, 551 U. S. 537
(2007), the Court considered another interlocutory order
denying qualified immunity. The legal issue there was
whether a Bivens action can be employed to challenge inter
ference with property rights. 551 U. S., at 549, n. 4. These
cases cannot be squared with respondent’s argument that the
collateral-order doctrine restricts appellate jurisdiction to
the “ultimate issu[e]” whether the legal wrong asserted was
a violation of clearly established law while excluding the
question whether the facts pleaded establish such a violation.
Iqbal Brief 15. Indeed, the latter question is even more
clearly within the category of appealable decisions than the
questions presented in Hartman and Wilkie, since whether a
particular complaint sufficiently alleges a clearly established
violation of law cannot be decided in isolation from the facts
pleaded. In that sense the sufficiency of respondent’s plead
ings is both “inextricably intertwined with,” Swint v. Cham
bers County Comm’n, 514 U. S. 35, 51 (1995), and “directly
implicated by,” Hartman, supra, at 257, n. 5, the qualified
immunity defense.
Respondent counters that our holding in Johnson, 515
U. S. 304, confirms the want of subject-matter jurisdiction
here. That is incorrect. The allegation in Johnson was
that five defendants, all of them police officers, unlawfully
beat the plaintiff. Johnson considered “the appealability of
a portion of ” the District Court’s summary judgment order

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that, “though entered in a ‘qualified immunity’ case, deter
mine[d] only” that there was a genuine issue of material fact
that three of the defendants participated in the beating.
Id., at 313.
In finding that order not a “final decision” for purposes of
§ 1291, the Johnson Court cited Mitchell for the proposition
that only decisions turning “ ‘on an issue of law’ ” are subject
to immediate appeal. 515 U. S., at 313. Though determin
ing whether there is a genuine issue of material fact at sum
mary judgment is a question of law, it is a legal question that
sits near the law-fact divide. Or as we said in Johnson, it
is a “fact-related” legal inquiry. Id., at 314. To conduct it,
a court of appeals may be required to consult a “vast pretrial
record, with numerous conflicting affidavits, depositions, and
other discovery materials.” Id., at 316. That process gen
erally involves matters more within a district court’s ken and
may replicate inefficiently questions that will arise on appeal
following final judgment. Ibid. Finding those concerns
predominant, Johnson held that the collateral orders that are
“final” under Mitchell turn on “abstract,” rather than “fact
based,” issues of law. 515 U. S., at 317.
The concerns that animated the decision in Johnson are
absent when an appellate court considers the disposition of
a motion to dismiss a complaint for insufficient pleadings.
True, the categories of “fact-based” and “abstract” legal
questions used to guide the Court’s decision in Johnson are
not well defined. Here, however, the order denying peti
tioners’ motion to dismiss falls well within the latter class.
Reviewing that order, the Court of Appeals considered only
the allegations contained within the four corners of respond
ent’s complaint; resort to a “vast pretrial record” on petition
ers’ motion to dismiss was unnecessary. Id., at 316. And
determining whether respondent’s complaint has the “heft”
to state a claim is a task well within an appellate court’s core
competency. Twombly, 550 U. S., at 557. Evaluating the
sufficiency of a complaint is not a “fact-based” question of
law, so the problem the Court sought to avoid in Johnson

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is not implicated here. The District Court’s order denying
petitioners’ motion to dismiss is a final decision under the
collateral-order doctrine over which the Court of Appeals
had, and this Court has, jurisdiction. We proceed to con
sider the merits of petitioners’ appeal.
III
In Twombly, supra, at 553–554, the Court found it neces
sary first to discuss the antitrust principles implicated by the
complaint. Here too we begin by taking note of the ele
ments a plaintiff must plead to state a claim of unconstitu
tional discrimination against officials entitled to assert the
defense of qualified immunity.
In Bivens—proceeding on the theory that a right suggests
a remedy—this Court “recognized for the first time an im
plied private action for damages against federal officers al
leged to have violated a citizen’s constitutional rights.”
Correctional Services Corp. v. Malesko, 534 U. S. 61, 66
(2001). Because implied causes of action are disfavored, the
Court has been reluctant to extend Bivens liability “to any
new context or new category of defendants.” 534 U. S.,
at 68. See also Wilkie, 551 U. S., at 549–550. That reluc
tance might well have disposed of respondent’s First Amend
ment claim of religious discrimination. For while we have
allowed a Bivens action to redress a violation of the equal
protection component of the Due Process Clause of the Fifth
Amendment, see Davis v. Passman, 442 U. S. 228 (1979), we
have not found an implied damages remedy under the Free
Exercise Clause. Indeed, we have declined to extend
Bivens to a claim sounding in the First Amendment. Bush
v. Lucas, 462 U. S. 367 (1983). Petitioners do not press this
argument, however, so we assume, without deciding, that
respondent’s First Amendment claim is actionable under
Bivens.
In the limited settings where Bivens does apply, the im
plied cause of action is the “federal analog to suits brought
against state officials under Rev. Stat. § 1979, 42 U. S. C.

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§ 1983.” Hartman, 547 U. S., at 254, n. 2. Cf. Wilson v.
Layne, 526 U. S. 603, 609 (1999). Based on the rules our
precedents establish, respondent correctly concedes that
Government officials may not be held liable for the unconsti
tutional conduct of their subordinates under a theory of re
spondeat superior. Iqbal Brief 46 (“[I]t is undisputed that
supervisory Bivens liability cannot be established solely on
a theory of respondeat superior”). See Monell v. New York
City Dept. of Social Servs., 436 U. S. 658, 691 (1978) (finding
no vicarious liability for a municipal “person” under 42
U. S. C. § 1983); see also Dunlop v. Munroe, 7 Cranch 242,
269 (1812) (a federal official’s liability “will only result from
his own neglect in not properly superintending the dis
charge” of his subordinates’ duties); Robertson v. Sichel, 127
U. S. 507, 515–516 (1888) (“A public officer or agent is not
responsible for the misfeasances or positive wrongs, or for
the nonfeasances, or negligences, or omissions of duty, of the
subagents or servants or other persons properly employed
by or under him, in the discharge of his official duties”). Be
cause vicarious liability is inapplicable to Bivens and § 1983
suits, a plaintiff must plead that each Government-official de
fendant, through the official’s own individual actions, has vio
lated the Constitution.
The factors necessary to establish a Bivens violation will
vary with the constitutional provision at issue. Where the
claim is invidious discrimination in contravention of the First
and Fifth Amendments, our decisions make clear that the
plaintiff must plead and prove that the defendant acted with
discriminatory purpose. Church of Lukumi Babalu Aye,
Inc. v. Hialeah, 508 U. S. 520, 540–541 (1993) (opinion of
Kennedy, J.) (First Amendment); Washington v. Davis, 426
U. S. 229, 240 (1976) (Fifth Amendment). Under extant
precedent purposeful discrimination requires more than “in
tent as volition or intent as awareness of consequences.”
Personnel Administrator of Mass. v. Feeney, 442 U. S. 256,
279 (1979). It instead involves a decisionmaker’s undertak

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ing a course of action “ ‘because of,’ not merely ‘in spite of,’
[the action’s] adverse effects upon an identifiable group.”
Ibid. It follows that, to state a claim based on a violation of
a clearly established right, respondent must plead sufficient
factual matter to show that petitioners adopted and imple
mented the detention policies at issue not for a neutral, in
vestigative reason but for the purpose of discriminating on
account of race, religion, or national origin.
Respondent disagrees. He argues that, under a theory of
“supervisory liability,” petitioners can be liable for “knowl
edge and acquiescence in their subordinates’ use of dis
criminatory criteria to make classification decisions among
detainees.” Iqbal Brief 45–46. That is to say, respondent
believes a supervisor’s mere knowledge of his subordinate’s
discriminatory purpose amounts to the supervisor’s violating
the Constitution. We reject this argument. Respondent’s
conception of “supervisory liability” is inconsistent with his
accurate stipulation that petitioners may not be held ac
countable for the misdeeds of their agents. In a § 1983 suit
or a Bivens action—where masters do not answer for the
torts of their servants—the term “supervisory liability” is a
misnomer. Absent vicarious liability, each Government of
ficial, his or her title notwithstanding, is only liable for his or
her own misconduct. In the context of determining whether
there is a violation of a clearly established right to over
come qualified immunity, purpose rather than knowledge
is required to impose Bivens liability on the subordinate
for unconstitutional discrimination; the same holds true for
an official charged with violations arising from his or her
superintendent responsibilities.
IV
A
We turn to respondent’s complaint. Under Federal Rule
of Civil Procedure 8(a)(2), a pleading must contain a “short
and plain statement of the claim showing that the pleader is

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entitled to relief.” As the Court held in Twombly, 550 U. S.
544, the pleading standard Rule 8 announces does not require
“detailed factual allegations,” but it demands more than an
unadorned, the-defendant-unlawfully-harmed-me accusation.
Id., at 555 (citing Papasan v. Allain, 478 U. S. 265, 286
(1986)). A pleading that offers “labels and conclusions” or
“a formulaic recitation of the elements of a cause of action
will not do.” 550 U. S., at 555. Nor does a complaint suffice
if it tenders “naked assertion[s]” devoid of “further factual
enhancement.” Id., at 557.
To survive a motion to dismiss, a complaint must contain
sufficient factual matter, accepted as true, to “state a claim
to relief that is plausible on its face.” Id., at 570. A claim
has facial plausibility when the plaintiff pleads factual con
tent that allows the court to draw the reasonable inference
that the defendant is liable for the misconduct alleged. Id.,
at 556. The plausibility standard is not akin to a “probabil
ity requirement,” but it asks for more than a sheer possibil
ity that a defendant has acted unlawfully. Ibid. Where a
complaint pleads facts that are “merely consistent with” a
defendant’s liability, it “stops short of the line between possi
bility and plausibility of ‘entitlement to relief.’ ” Id., at 557
(brackets omitted).
Two working principles underlie our decision in Twombly.
First, the tenet that a court must accept as true all of the
allegations contained in a complaint is inapplicable to legal
conclusions. Threadbare recitals of the elements of a cause
of action, supported by mere conclusory statements, do not
suffice. Id., at 555 (Although for the purposes of a motion
to dismiss we must take all of the factual allegations in the
complaint as true, we “are not bound to accept as true a legal
conclusion couched as a factual allegation” (internal quota
tion marks omitted)). Rule 8 marks a notable and generous
departure from the hypertechnical, code-pleading regime of
a prior era, but it does not unlock the doors of discovery for

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a plaintiff armed with nothing more than conclusions. Sec
ond, only a complaint that states a plausible claim for relief
survives a motion to dismiss. Id., at 556. Determining
whether a complaint states a plausible claim for relief will,
as the Court of Appeals observed, be a context-specific task
that requires the reviewing court to draw on its judicial ex
perience and common sense. 490 F. 3d, at 157–158. But
where the well-pleaded facts do not permit the court to infer
more than the mere possibility of misconduct, the complaint
has alleged—but it has not “show[n]”—“that the pleader is
entitled to relief.” Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 8(a)(2).
In keeping with these principles a court considering a mo
tion to dismiss can choose to begin by identifying pleadings
that, because they are no more than conclusions, are not enti
tled to the assumption of truth. While legal conclusions can
provide the framework of a complaint, they must be sup
ported by factual allegations. When there are well-pleaded
factual allegations, a court should assume their veracity and
then determine whether they plausibly give rise to an enti
tlement to relief.
Our decision in Twombly illustrates the two-pronged ap
proach. There, we considered the sufficiency of a complaint
alleging that incumbent telecommunications providers had
entered an agreement not to compete and to forestall com
petitive entry, in violation of the Sherman Act, 15 U. S. C.
§ 1. Recognizing that § 1 enjoins only anticompetitive con
duct “effected by a contract, combination, or conspiracy,”
Copperweld Corp. v. Independence Tube Corp., 467 U. S. 752,
775 (1984), the plaintiffs in Twombly flatly pleaded that
the defendants “ha[d] entered into a contract, combination
or conspiracy to prevent competitive entry . . . and ha[d]
agreed not to compete with one another.” 550 U. S., at 551
(internal quotation marks omitted). The complaint also al
leged that the defendants’ “parallel course of conduct . . . to
prevent competition” and inflate prices was indicative of the

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unlawful agreement alleged. Ibid. (internal quotation
marks omitted).
The Court held the plaintiffs’ complaint deficient under
Rule 8. In doing so it first noted that the plaintiffs’ asser
tion of an unlawful agreement was a “ ‘legal conclusion’ ” and,
as such, was not entitled to the assumption of truth. Id.,
at 555. Had the Court simply credited the allegation of a
conspiracy, the plaintiffs would have stated a claim for relief
and been entitled to proceed perforce. The Court next
addressed the “nub” of the plaintiffs’ complaint—the well
pleaded, nonconclusory factual allegation of parallel behav
ior—to determine whether it gave rise to a “plausible sug
gestion of conspiracy.” Id., at 565–566. Acknowledging
that parallel conduct was consistent with an unlawful agree
ment, the Court nevertheless concluded that it did not plausi
bly suggest an illicit accord because it was not only compati
ble with, but indeed was more likely explained by, lawful,
unchoreographed free-market behavior. Id., at 567. Be
cause the well-pleaded fact of parallel conduct, accepted as
true, did not plausibly suggest an unlawful agreement, the
Court held the plaintiffs’ complaint must be dismissed. Id.,
at 570.
B
Under Twombly’s construction of Rule 8, we conclude that
respondent’s complaint has not “nudged [his] claims” of invid
ious discrimination “across the line from conceivable to plau
sible.” Ibid.
We begin our analysis by identifying the allegations in the
complaint that are not entitled to the assumption of truth.
Respondent pleads that petitioners “knew of, condoned, and
willfully and maliciously agreed to subject [him]” to harsh
conditions of confinement “as a matter of policy, solely on
account of [his] religion, race, and/or national origin and for
no legitimate penological interest.” Complaint ¶ 96, App. to
Pet. for Cert. 173a–174a. The complaint alleges that Ash
croft was the “principal architect” of this invidious policy,

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id., ¶ 10, at 157a, and that Mueller was “instrumental” in
adopting and executing it, id., ¶ 11, at 157a. These bare as
sertions, much like the pleading of conspiracy in Twombly,
amount to nothing more than a “formulaic recitation of the
elements” of a constitutional discrimination claim, 550 U. S.,
at 555, namely, that petitioners adopted a policy “ ‘because
of,’ not merely ‘in spite of,’ its adverse effects upon an identi
fiable group,” Feeney, 442 U. S., at 279. As such, the allega
tions are conclusory and not entitled to be assumed true.
Twombly, 550 U. S., at 554–555. To be clear, we do not re
ject these bald allegations on the ground that they are unre
alistic or nonsensical. We do not so characterize them any
more than the Court in Twombly rejected the plaintiffs’ ex
press allegation of a “ ‘contract, combination or conspiracy to
prevent competitive entry,’ ” id., at 551, because it thought
that claim too chimerical to be maintained. It is the con
clusory nature of respondent’s allegations, rather than their
extravagantly fanciful nature, that disentitles them to the
presumption of truth.
We next consider the factual allegations in respondent’s
complaint to determine if they plausibly suggest an entitle
ment to relief. The complaint alleges that “the [FBI], under
the direction of Defendant MUELLER, arrested and de
tained thousands of Arab Muslim men . . . as part of its inves
tigation of the events of September 11.” Complaint ¶ 47,
App. to Pet. for Cert. 164a. It further claims that “[t]he
policy of holding post-September-11th detainees in highly re
strictive conditions of confinement until they were ‘cleared’
by the FBI was approved by Defendants ASHCROFT and
MUELLER in discussions in the weeks after September 11,
2001.” Id., ¶ 69, at 168a. Taken as true, these allegations
are consistent with petitioners’ purposefully designating de
tainees “of high interest” because of their race, religion, or
national origin. But given more likely explanations, they do
not plausibly establish this purpose.

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The September 11 attacks were perpetrated by 19 Arab
Muslim hijackers who counted themselves members in good
standing of al Qaeda, an Islamic fundamentalist group. Al
Qaeda was headed by another Arab Muslim—Osama bin
Laden—and composed in large part of his Arab Muslim disci
ples. It should come as no surprise that a legitimate policy
directing law enforcement to arrest and detain individuals
because of their suspected link to the attacks would produce
a disparate, incidental impact on Arab Muslims, even though
the purpose of the policy was to target neither Arabs nor
Muslims. On the facts respondent alleges the arrests Muel
ler oversaw were likely lawful and justified by his nondis
criminatory intent to detain aliens who were illegally pres
ent in the United States and who had potential connections
to those who committed terrorist acts. As between that
“obvious alternative explanation” for the arrests, Twombly,
supra, at 567, and the purposeful, invidious discrimination
respondent asks us to infer, discrimination is not a plausible
conclusion.
But even if the complaint’s well-pleaded facts give rise to
a plausible inference that respondent’s arrest was the re
sult of unconstitutional discrimination, that inference alone
would not entitle respondent to relief. It is important to
recall that respondent’s complaint challenges neither the con
stitutionality of his arrest nor his initial detention in the
MDC. Respondent’s constitutional claims against petition
ers rest solely on their ostensible “policy of holding post
September-11th detainees” in the ADMAX SHU once they
were categorized as “of high interest.” Complaint ¶ 69,
App. to Pet. for Cert. 168a. To prevail on that theory,
the complaint must contain facts plausibly showing that peti
tioners purposefully adopted a policy of classifying post
September-11 detainees as “of high interest” because of their
race, religion, or national origin.
This the complaint fails to do. Though respondent alleges
that various other defendants, who are not before us, may

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have labeled him a person “of high interest” for impermissi
ble reasons, his only factual allegation against petitioners ac
cuses them of adopting a policy approving “restrictive
conditions of confinement” for post-September-11 detainees
until they were “ ‘cleared’ by the FBI.” Ibid. Accepting
the truth of that allegation, the complaint does not show, or
even intimate, that petitioners purposefully housed detain
ees in the ADMAX SHU due to their race, religion, or na
tional origin. All it plausibly suggests is that the Nation’s
top law enforcement officers, in the aftermath of a devastat
ing terrorist attack, sought to keep suspected terrorists in
the most secure conditions available until the suspects could
be cleared of terrorist activity. Respondent does not argue,
nor can he, that such a motive would violate petitioners’ con
stitutional obligations. He would need to allege more by
way of factual content to “nudg[e]” his claim of purposeful
discrimination “across the line from conceivable to plausi
ble.” Twombly, 550 U. S., at 570.
To be sure, respondent can attempt to draw certain con
trasts between the pleadings the Court considered in Twom
bly and the pleadings at issue here. In Twombly, the
complaint alleged general wrongdoing that extended over
a period of years, id., at 551, whereas here the complaint
alleges discrete wrongs—for instance, beatings—by lower
level Government actors. The allegations here, if true, and
if condoned by petitioners, could be the basis for some infer
ence of wrongful intent on petitioners’ part. Despite these
distinctions, respondent’s pleadings do not suffice to state a
claim. Unlike in Twombly, where the doctrine of respon
deat superior could bind the corporate defendant, here, as
we have noted, petitioners cannot be held liable unless they
themselves acted on account of a constitutionally protected
characteristic. Yet respondent’s complaint does not contain
any factual allegation sufficient to plausibly suggest petition
ers’ discriminatory state of mind. His pleadings thus do not
meet the standard necessary to comply with Rule 8.

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It is important to note, however, that we express no opin
ion concerning the sufficiency of respondent’s complaint
against the defendants who are not before us. Respondent’s
account of his prison ordeal alleges serious official miscon
duct that we need not address here. Our decision is limited
to the determination that respondent’s complaint does not
entitle him to relief from petitioners.
C
Respondent offers three arguments that bear on our dispo
sition of his case, but none is persuasive.
1
Respondent first says that our decision in Twombly should
be limited to pleadings made in the context of an antitrust
dispute. Iqbal Brief 37–38. This argument is not sup
ported by Twombly and is incompatible with the Federal
Rules of Civil Procedure. Though Twombly determined the
sufficiency of a complaint sounding in antitrust, the decision
was based on our interpretation and application of Rule 8.
550 U. S., at 554. That Rule in turn governs the pleading
standard “in all civil actions and proceedings in the United
States district courts.” Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 1. Our deci
sion in Twombly expounded the pleading standard for “all
civil actions,” ibid., and it applies to antitrust and discrimina
tion suits alike, see 550 U. S., at 555–556, and n. 3.
2
Respondent next implies that our construction of Rule 8
should be tempered where, as here, the Court of Appeals has
“instructed the district court to cabin discovery in such a
way as to preserve” petitioners’ defense of qualified immu
nity “as much as possible in anticipation of a summary judg
ment motion.” Iqbal Brief 27. We have held, however,
that the question presented by a motion to dismiss a com
plaint for insufficient pleadings does not turn on the controls

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placed upon the discovery process. Twombly, supra, at 559
(“It is no answer to say that a claim just shy of a plausible
entitlement to relief can, if groundless, be weeded out early
in the discovery process through careful case management
given the common lament that the success of judicial supervi
sion in checking discovery abuse has been on the modest
side” (internal quotation marks and citation omitted)).
Our rejection of the careful-case-management approach is
especially important in suits where Government-official de
fendants are entitled to assert the defense of qualified immu
nity. The basic thrust of the qualified-immunity doctrine is
to free officials from the concerns of litigation, including
“avoidance of disruptive discovery.” Siegert v. Gilley, 500
U. S. 226, 236 (1991) (Kennedy, J., concurring in judgment).
There are serious and legitimate reasons for this. If a Gov
ernment official is to devote time to his or her duties, and to
the formulation of sound and responsible policies, it is coun
terproductive to require the substantial diversion that is at
tendant to participating in litigation and making informed
decisions as to how it should proceed. Litigation, though
necessary to ensure that officials comply with the law, exacts
heavy costs in terms of efficiency and expenditure of valuable
time and resources that might otherwise be directed to the
proper execution of the work of the Government. The costs
of diversion are only magnified when Government officials
are charged with responding to, as Judge Cabranes aptly
put it, “a national and international security emergency un
precedented in the history of the American Republic.” 490
F. 3d, at 179.
It is no answer to these concerns to say that discovery for
petitioners can be deferred while pretrial proceedings con
tinue for other defendants. It is quite likely that, when dis
covery as to the other parties proceeds, it would prove neces
sary for petitioners and their counsel to participate in the
process to ensure the case does not develop in a misleading
or slanted way that causes prejudice to their position. Even

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if petitioners are not yet themselves subject to discovery
orders, then, they would not be free from the burdens of
discovery.
We decline respondent’s invitation to relax the pleading
requirements on the ground that the Court of Appeals prom
ises petitioners minimally intrusive discovery. That prom
ise provides especially cold comfort in this pleading context,
where we are impelled to give real content to the concept of
qualified immunity for high-level officials who must be nei
ther deterred nor detracted from the vigorous performance
of their duties. Because respondent’s complaint is deficient
under Rule 8, he is not entitled to discovery, cabined or
otherwise.
3
Respondent finally maintains that the Federal Rules ex
pressly allow him to allege petitioners’ discriminatory intent
“generally,” which he equates with a conclusory allegation.
Iqbal Brief 32 (citing Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 9). It follows,
respondent says, that his complaint is sufficiently well
pleaded because it claims that petitioners discriminated
against him “on account of [his] religion, race, and/or national
origin and for no legitimate penological interest.” Com
plaint ¶ 96, App. to Pet. for Cert. 172a–173a. Were we
required to accept this allegation as true, respondent’s
complaint would survive petitioners’ motion to dismiss. But
the Federal Rules do not require courts to credit a com
plaint’s conclusory statements without reference to its fac
tual context.
It is true that Rule 9(b) requires particularity when plead
ing “fraud or mistake,” while allowing “[m]alice, intent,
knowledge, and other conditions of a person’s mind [to] be
alleged generally.” But “generally” is a relative term. In
the context of Rule 9, it is to be compared to the particularity
requirement applicable to fraud or mistake. Rule 9 merely
excuses a party from pleading discriminatory intent under
an elevated pleading standard. It does not give him license

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to evade the less rigid—though still operative—strictures of
Rule 8. See 5A C. Wright & A. Miller, Federal Practice and
Procedure § 1301, p. 291 (3d ed. 2004) (“[A] rigid rule requir
ing the detailed pleading of a condition of mind would be
undesirable because, absent overriding considerations press
ing for a specificity requirement, as in the case of averments
of fraud or mistake, the general ‘short and plain statement
of the claim’ mandate in Rule 8(a) . . . should control the
second sentence of Rule 9(b)”). And Rule 8 does not em
power respondent to plead the bare elements of his cause of
action, affix the label “general allegation,” and expect his
complaint to survive a motion to dismiss.
V
We hold that respondent’s complaint fails to plead suffi
cient facts to state a claim for purposeful and unlawful dis
crimination against petitioners. The Court of Appeals
should decide in the first instance whether to remand to the
District Court so that respondent can seek leave to amend
his deficient complaint.
The judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed, and
the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with
this opinion.
It is so ordered.
Justice Souter, with whom Justice Stevens, Justice
Ginsburg, and Justice Breyer join, dissenting.
This case is here on the uncontested assumption that
Bivens v. Six Unknown Fed. Narcotics Agents, 403 U. S. 388
(1971), allows personal liability based on a federal officer’s
violation of an individual’s rights under the First and Fifth
Amendments, and it comes to us with the explicit concession
of petitioners Ashcroft and Mueller that an officer may be
subject to Bivens liability as a supervisor on grounds other
than respondeat superior. The Court apparently rejects
this concession and, although it has no bearing on the ma

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Souter, J., dissenting
jority’s resolution of this case, does away with supervisory
liability under Bivens. The majority then misapplies the
pleading standard under Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly,
550 U. S. 544 (2007), to conclude that the complaint fails to
state a claim. I respectfully dissent from both the rejection
of supervisory liability as a cognizable claim in the face of
petitioners’ concession, and from the holding that the com
plaint fails to satisfy Rule 8(a)(2) of the Federal Rules of
Civil Procedure.
I
A
Respondent Iqbal was arrested in November 2001 on
charges of conspiracy to defraud the United States and fraud
in relation to identification documents, and was placed in pre
trial detention at the Metropolitan Detention Center in
Brooklyn, New York. Iqbal v. Hasty, 490 F. 3d 143, 147–148
(CA2 2007). He alleges that Federal Bureau of Investiga
tion (FBI) officials carried out a discriminatory policy by des
ignating him as a person “ ‘of high interest’ ” in the investiga
tion of the September 11 attacks solely because of his race,
religion, or national origin. Owing to this designation he
was placed in the detention center’s Administrative Maxi
mum Special Housing Unit for over six months while await
ing the fraud trial. Id., at 148. As I will mention more
fully below, Iqbal contends that Ashcroft and Mueller were
at the very least aware of the discriminatory detention policy
and condoned it (and perhaps even took part in devising it),
thereby violating his First and Fifth Amendment rights.1
Iqbal claims that on the day he was transferred to the
special unit, prison guards, without provocation, “picked him
up and threw him against the wall, kicked him in the stom
1 Iqbal makes no claim against Ashcroft and Mueller based simply on
his right, as a pretrial detainee, to be free from punishment prior to an
adjudication of guilt on the fraud charges. See Bell v. Wolfish, 441 U. S.
520, 535 (1979).

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ach, punched him in the face, and dragged him across the
room.” First Amended Complaint in No. 04–CV–1809 (JG)
(JA), ¶ 113, App. to Pet. for Cert. 176a (hereinafter Com
plaint). He says that after being attacked a second time he
sought medical attention but was denied care for two weeks.
Id., ¶¶ 187–188, at 189a. According to Iqbal’s complaint,
prison staff in the special unit subjected him to unjustified
strip and body cavity searches, id., ¶¶ 136–140, at 181a, ver
bally berated him as a “ ‘terrorist’ ” and “ ‘Muslim killer,’ ”
id., ¶ 87, at 170a–171a, refused to give him adequate food,
id., ¶ 91, at 171a–172a, and intentionally turned on air condi
tioning during the winter and heating during the summer,
id., ¶ 84, at 170a. He claims that prison staff interfered with
his attempts to pray and engage in religious study, id.,
¶¶ 153–154, at 183a–184a, and with his access to counsel, id.,
¶¶ 168, 171, at 186a–187a.
The District Court denied Ashcroft and Mueller’s motion
to dismiss Iqbal’s discrimination claim, and the Court of Ap
peals affirmed. Ashcroft and Mueller then asked this Court
to grant certiorari on two questions:
“1. Whether a conclusory allegation that a cabinet-level
officer or other high-ranking official knew of, condoned,
or agreed to subject a plaintiff to allegedly uncon
stitutional acts purportedly committed by subordinate
officials is sufficient to state individual-capacity claims
against those officials under Bivens.
“2. Whether a cabinet-level officer or other high
ranking official may be held personally liable for the al
legedly unconstitutional acts of subordinate officials on
the ground that, as high-level supervisors, they had con
structive notice of the discrimination allegedly carried
out by such subordinate officials.” Pet. for Cert. I.
The Court granted certiorari on both questions. The first
is about pleading; the second goes to the liability standard.

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In the first question, Ashcroft and Mueller did not ask
whether “a cabinet-level officer or other high-ranking offi
cial” who “knew of, condoned, or agreed to subject a plaintiff
to allegedly unconstitutional acts committed by subordinate
officials” was subject to liability under Bivens. In fact, they
conceded in their petition for certiorari that they would be
liable if they had “actual knowledge” of discrimination by
their subordinates and exhibited “ ‘deliberate indifference’ ”
to that discrimination. Pet. for Cert. 29 (quoting Farmer v.
Brennan, 511 U. S. 825, 837 (1994)). Instead, they asked the
Court to address whether Iqbal’s allegations against them
(which they call conclusory) were sufficient to satisfy Rule
8(a)(2), and in particular whether the Court of Appeals mis
applied our decision in Twombly construing that rule. Pet.
for Cert. 11–24.
In the second question, Ashcroft and Mueller asked this
Court to say whether they could be held personally liable for
the actions of their subordinates based on the theory that
they had constructive notice of their subordinates’ unconsti
tutional conduct. Id., at 25–33. This was an odd question
to pose, since Iqbal has never claimed that Ashcroft and
Mueller are liable on a constructive notice theory. Be that
as it may, the second question challenged only one possible
ground for imposing supervisory liability under Bivens. In
sum, both questions assumed that a defendant could raise a
Bivens claim on theories of supervisory liability other than
constructive notice, and neither question asked the parties
or the Court to address the elements of such liability.
The briefing at the merits stage was no different. Ash
croft and Mueller argued that the factual allegations in Iq
bal’s complaint were insufficient to overcome their claim of
qualified immunity; they also contended that they could not
be held liable on a theory of constructive notice. Again they
conceded, however, that they would be subject to supervi
sory liability if they “had actual knowledge of the assertedly
discriminatory nature of the classification of suspects as

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Souter, J., dissenting
being ‘of high interest’ and they were deliberately indifferent
to that discrimination.” Brief for Petitioners 50; see also
Reply Brief for Petitioners 21–22. Iqbal argued that the al
legations in his complaint were sufficient under Rule 8(a)(2)
and Twombly, and conceded that as a matter of law he could
not recover under a theory of respondeat superior. See
Brief for Respondent Iqbal 46. Thus, the parties agreed as
to a proper standard of supervisory liability, and the disputed
question was whether Iqbal’s complaint satisfied Rule 8(a)(2).
Without acknowledging the parties’ agreement as to the
standard of supervisory liability, the Court asserts that it
must sua sponte decide the scope of supervisory liability
here. Ante, at 675–677. I agree that, absent Ashcroft and
Mueller’s concession, that determination would have to be
made; without knowing the elements of a supervisory liabil
ity claim, there would be no way to determine whether a
plaintiff had made factual allegations amounting to grounds
for relief on that claim. See Twombly, 550 U. S., at 557–558.
But deciding the scope of supervisory Bivens liability in this
case is uncalled for. There are several reasons, starting
with the position Ashcroft and Mueller have taken and fol
lowing from it.
First, Ashcroft and Mueller have, as noted, made the criti
cal concession that a supervisor’s knowledge of a subordi
nate’s unconstitutional conduct and deliberate indifference to
that conduct are grounds for Bivens liability. Iqbal seeks
to recover on a theory that Ashcroft and Mueller at least
knowingly acquiesced (and maybe more than acquiesced) in
the discriminatory acts of their subordinates; if he can show
this, he will satisfy Ashcroft and Mueller’s own test for su
pervisory liability. See Farmer, supra, at 842 (explaining
that a prison official acts with “deliberate indifference” if
“the official acted or failed to act despite his knowledge of
a substantial risk of serious harm”). We do not normally
override a party’s concession, see, e. g., United States v. In
ternational Business Machines Corp., 517 U. S. 843, 855

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(1996) (holding that “[i]t would be inappropriate for us to
[e]xamine in this case, without the benefit of the parties’
briefing,” an issue the Government had conceded), and doing
so is especially inappropriate when, as here, the issue is un
necessary to decide the case, see infra, at 694. I would
therefore accept Ashcroft and Mueller’s concession for pur
poses of this case and proceed to consider whether the com
plaint alleges at least knowledge and deliberate indifference.
Second, because of the concession, we have received no
briefing or argument on the proper scope of supervisory lia
bility, much less the full-dress argument we normally re
quire. Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U. S. 643, 676–677 (1961) (Harlan,
J., dissenting). We consequently are in no position to decide
the precise contours of supervisory liability here, this issue
being a complicated one that has divided the Courts of Ap
peals. See infra, at 693–694. This Court recently re
marked on the danger of “bad decisionmaking” when the
briefing on a question is “woefully inadequate,” Pearson v.
Callahan, 555 U. S. 223, 239 (2009), yet today the majority
answers a question with no briefing at all. The attendant
risk of error is palpable.
Finally, the Court’s approach is most unfair to Iqbal. He
was entitled to rely on Ashcroft and Mueller’s concession,
both in their petition for certiorari and in their merits briefs,
that they could be held liable on a theory of knowledge and
deliberate indifference. By overriding that concession, the
Court denies Iqbal a fair chance to be heard on the question.
B
The majority, however, does ignore the concession. Ac
cording to the majority, because Iqbal concededly cannot re
cover on a theory of respondeat superior, it follows that he
cannot recover under any theory of supervisory liability.
Ante, at 677. The majority says that in a Bivens action,
“where masters do not answer for the torts of their serv
ants,” “the term ‘supervisory liability’ is a misnomer,” and

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that “[a]bsent vicarious liability, each Government official,
his or her title notwithstanding, is only liable for his or her
own misconduct.” Ibid. Lest there be any mistake, in
these words the majority is not narrowing the scope of su
pervisory liability; it is eliminating Bivens supervisory liabil
ity entirely. The nature of a supervisory liability theory is
that the supervisor may be liable, under certain conditions,
for the wrongdoing of his subordinates, and it is this very
principle that the majority rejects. Ante, at 683 (“[P]eti
tioners cannot be held liable unless they themselves acted on
account of a constitutionally protected characteristic”).
The dangers of the majority’s readiness to proceed without
briefing and argument are apparent in its cursory analysis,
which rests on the assumption that only two outcomes are
possible here: respondeat superior liability, in which “[a]n
employer is subject to liability for torts committed by em
ployees while acting within the scope of their employment,”
Restatement (Third) of Agency § 2.04 (2005), or no supervi
sory liability at all. The dichotomy is false. Even if an em
ployer is not liable for the actions of his employee solely
because the employee was acting within the scope of employ
ment, there still might be conditions to render a supervisor
liable for the conduct of his subordinate. See, e. g., Whitfield
v. Mele´ndez-Rivera, 431 F. 3d 1, 14 (CA1 2005) (distinguish
ing between respondeat superior liability and supervisory
liability); Bennett v. Eastpointe, 410 F. 3d 810, 818 (CA6
2005) (same); Richardson v. Goord, 347 F. 3d 431, 435 (CA2
2003) (same); Hall v. Lombardi, 996 F. 2d 954, 961 (CA8
1993) (same).
In fact, there is quite a spectrum of possible tests for su
pervisory liability: it could be imposed where a supervisor
has actual knowledge of a subordinate’s constitutional viola
tion and acquiesces, see, e. g., Baker v. Monroe Twp., 50 F. 3d
1186, 1994 (CA3 1995); Woodward v. Worland, 977 F. 2d 1392,
1400 (CA10 1992); or where supervisors “ ‘know about the
conduct and facilitate it, approve it, condone it, or turn a

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blind eye for fear of what they might see,’ ” International
Action Center v. United States, 365 F. 3d 20, 28 (CADC 2004)
(Roberts, J.) (quoting Jones v. Chicago, 856 F. 2d 985, 992
(CA7 1988) (Posner, J.)); or where the supervisor has no ac
tual knowledge of the violation but was reckless in his super
vision of the subordinate, see, e. g., Hall, supra, at 961; or
where the supervisor was grossly negligent, see, e. g., Lipsett
v. University of Puerto Rico, 864 F. 2d 881, 902 (CA1 1988).
I am unsure what the general test for supervisory liability
should be, and in the absence of briefing and argument I am
in no position to choose or devise one.
Neither is the majority, but what is most remarkable about
its foray into supervisory liability is that its conclusion has
no bearing on its resolution of the case. The majority says
that all of the allegations in the complaint that Ashcroft and
Mueller authorized, condoned, or even were aware of their
subordinates’ discriminatory conduct are “conclusory” and
therefore are “not entitled to be assumed true.” Ante, at
681. As I explain below, this conclusion is unsound, but on
the majority’s understanding of Rule 8(a)(2) pleading stand
ards, even if the majority accepted Ashcroft and Mueller’s
concession and asked whether the complaint sufficiently al
leges knowledge and deliberate indifference, it presumably
would still conclude that the complaint fails to plead suffi
cient facts and must be dismissed.2
II
Given petitioners’ concession, the complaint satisfies Rule
8(a)(2). Ashcroft and Mueller admit they are liable for their
subordinates’ conduct if they “had actual knowledge of the
assertedly discriminatory nature of the classification of sus
2 If I am mistaken, and the majority’s rejection of the concession is some
how outcome determinative, then its approach is even more unfair to Iqbal
than previously explained, see supra, at 692, for Iqbal had no reason to
argue the (apparently dispositive) supervisory liability standard in light of
the concession.

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pects as being ‘of high interest’ and they were deliberately
indifferent to that discrimination.” Brief for Petitioners 50.
Iqbal alleges that after the September 11 attacks the FBI
“arrested and detained thousands of Arab Muslim men,”
Complaint ¶ 47, App. to Pet. for Cert. 164a, that many of
these men were designated by high-ranking FBI officials as
being “ ‘of high interest,’ ” id., ¶¶ 48, 50, at 164a, and that
in many cases, including Iqbal’s, this designation was made
“because of the race, religion, and national origin of the de
tainees, and not because of any evidence of the detainees’
involvement in supporting terrorist activity,” id., ¶ 49, at
164a. The complaint further alleges that Ashcroft was the
“principal architect of the policies and practices challenged,”
id., ¶ 10, at 157a, and that Mueller “was instrumental in the
adoption, promulgation, and implementation of the policies
and practices challenged,” id., ¶ 11, at 157a. According to
the complaint, Ashcroft and Mueller “knew of, condoned, and
willfully and maliciously agreed to subject [Iqbal] to these
conditions of confinement as a matter of policy, solely on ac
count of [his] religion, race, and/or national origin and for
no legitimate penological interest.” Id., ¶ 96, at 172a–173a.
The complaint thus alleges, at a bare minimum, that Ashcroft
and Mueller knew of and condoned the discriminatory policy
their subordinates carried out. Actually, the complaint goes
further in alleging that Ashcroft and Mueller affirmatively
acted to create the discriminatory detention policy. If these
factual allegations are true, Ashcroft and Mueller were, at
the very least, aware of the discriminatory policy being im
plemented and deliberately indifferent to it.
Ashcroft and Mueller argue that these allegations fail to
satisfy the “plausibility standard” of Twombly. They con
tend that Iqbal’s claims are implausible because such high
ranking officials “tend not to be personally involved in the
specific actions of lower-level officers down the bureaucratic
chain of command.” Brief for Petitioners 28. But this re
sponse bespeaks a fundamental misunderstanding of the en

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quiry that Twombly demands. Twombly does not require a
court at the motion-to-dismiss stage to consider whether the
factual allegations are probably true. We made it clear, on
the contrary, that a court must take the allegations as true,
no matter how skeptical the court may be. See 550 U. S., at
555 (a court must proceed “on the assumption that all the
allegations in the complaint are true (even if doubtful in
fact)”); id., at 556 (“[A] well-pleaded complaint may proceed
even if it strikes a savvy judge that actual proof of the facts
alleged is improbable”); see also Neitzke v. Williams, 490
U. S. 319, 327 (1989) (“Rule 12(b)(6) does not countenance . . .
dismissals based on a judge’s disbelief of a complaint’s factual
allegations”). The sole exception to this rule lies with alle
gations that are sufficiently fantastic to defy reality as we
know it: claims about little green men, or the plaintiff ’s re
cent trip to Pluto, or experiences in time travel. That is not
what we have here.
Under Twombly, the relevant question is whether, assum
ing the factual allegations are true, the plaintiff has stated a
ground for relief that is plausible. That is, in Twombly’s
words, a plaintiff must “allege facts” that, taken as true, are
“suggestive of illegal conduct.” 550 U. S., at 564, n. 8. In
Twombly, we were faced with allegations of a conspiracy to
violate § 1 of the Sherman Act through parallel conduct.
The difficulty was that the conduct alleged was “consistent
with conspiracy, but just as much in line with a wide swath
of rational and competitive business strategy unilaterally
prompted by common perceptions of the market.” Id., at
554. We held that in that sort of circumstance, “[a]n allega
tion of parallel conduct is . . . much like a naked assertion of
conspiracy in a § 1 complaint: it gets the complaint close to
stating a claim, but without some further factual enhance
ment it stops short of the line between possibility and plausi
bility of ‘entitlement to relief.’ ” Id., at 557 (brackets omit
ted). Here, by contrast, the allegations in the complaint are
neither confined to naked legal conclusions nor consistent

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with legal conduct. The complaint alleges that FBI officials
discriminated against Iqbal solely on account of his race, reli
gion, and national origin, and it alleges the knowledge and
deliberate indifference that, by Ashcroft and Mueller’s own
admission, are sufficient to make them liable for the illegal
action. Iqbal’s complaint therefore contains “enough facts
to state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.” Id.,
at 570.
I do not understand the majority to disagree with this
understanding of “plausibility” under Twombly. Rather,
the majority discards the allegations discussed above with
regard to Ashcroft and Mueller as conclusory, and is left
considering only two statements in the complaint: that “the
[FBI], under the direction of Defendant MUELLER, ar
rested and detained thousands of Arab Muslim men . . . as
part of its investigation of the events of September 11,” Com
plaint ¶ 47, App. to Pet. for Cert. 164a, and that “[t]he policy
of holding post-September-11th detainees in highly restric
tive conditions of confinement until they were ‘cleared’ by
the FBI was approved by Defendants ASHCROFT and
MUELLER in discussions in the weeks after September 11,
2001,” id., ¶ 69, at 168a. See ante, at 681. I think the ma
jority is right in saying that these allegations suggest only
that Ashcroft and Mueller “sought to keep suspected terror
ists in the most secure conditions available until the suspects
could be cleared of terrorist activity,” ante, at 683, and that
this produced “a disparate, incidental impact on Arab Mus
lims,” ante, at 682. And I agree that the two allegations
selected by the majority, standing alone, do not state a plau
sible entitlement to relief for unconstitutional discrimination.
But these allegations do not stand alone as the only sig
nificant, nonconclusory statements in the complaint, for the
complaint contains many allegations linking Ashcroft and
Mueller to the discriminatory practices of their subordinates.
See Complaint ¶ 10, App. to Pet. for Cert. 157a (Ashcroft
was the “principal architect” of the discriminatory policy);

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id., ¶ 11, at 157a (Mueller was “instrumental” in adopting and
executing the discriminatory policy); id., ¶ 96, at 172a–173a
(Ashcroft and Mueller “knew of, condoned, and willfully and
maliciously agreed to subject” Iqbal to harsh conditions “as
a matter of policy, solely on account of [his] religion, race,
and/or national origin and for no legitimate penological
interest”).
The majority says that these are “bare assertions” that,
“much like the pleading of conspiracy in Twombly, amount
to nothing more than a ‘formulaic recitation of the elements’
of a constitutional discrimination claim” and therefore are
“not entitled to be assumed true.” Ante, at 681 (quoting
Twombly, supra, at 555). The fallacy of the majority’s posi
tion, however, lies in looking at the relevant assertions in
isolation. The complaint contains specific allegations that,
in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks, the Chief of
the FBI’s International Terrorism Operations Section and
the Assistant Special Agent in Charge for the FBI’s New
York Field Office implemented a policy that discriminated
against Arab Muslim men, including Iqbal, solely on account
of their race, religion, or national origin. See Complaint
¶¶ 47–53, supra, at 164a–165a. Viewed in light of these sub
sidiary allegations, the allegations singled out by the major
ity as “conclusory” are no such thing. Iqbal’s claim is not
that Ashcroft and Mueller “knew of, condoned, and willfully
and maliciously agreed to subject” him to a discriminatory
practice that is left undefined; his allegation is that “they
knew of, condoned, and willfully and maliciously agreed to
subject” him to a particular, discrete, discriminatory policy
detailed in the complaint. Iqbal does not say merely that
Ashcroft was the architect of some amorphous discrimina
tion, or that Mueller was instrumental in an ill-defined con
stitutional violation; he alleges that they helped to create the
discriminatory policy he has described. Taking the com
plaint as a whole, it gives Ashcroft and Mueller “ ‘fair notice
of what the . . . claim is and the grounds upon which it

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rests.’ ” Twombly, 550 U. S., at 555 (quoting Conley v. Gib
son, 355 U. S. 41, 47 (1957) (omission in original)).
That aside, the majority’s holding that the statements it
selects are conclusory cannot be squared with its treatment
of certain other allegations in the complaint as nonconclu
sory. For example, the majority takes as true the statement
that “[t]he policy of holding post-September-11th detainees
in highly restrictive conditions of confinement until they
were ‘cleared’ by the FBI was approved by Defendants
ASHCROFT and MUELLER in discussions in the weeks
after September 11, 2001.” Complaint ¶ 69, supra, at 168a;
see ante, at 681. This statement makes two points: (1) after
September 11, the FBI held certain detainees in highly re
strictive conditions, and (2) Ashcroft and Mueller discussed
and approved these conditions. If, as the majority says,
these allegations are not conclusory, then I cannot see why
the majority deems it merely conclusory when Iqbal alleges
that (1) after September 11, the FBI designated Arab Mus
lim detainees as being of “ ‘high interest’ ” “because of the
race, religion, and national origin of the detainees, and not
because of any evidence of the detainees’ involvement in sup
porting terrorist activity,” Complaint ¶¶ 48–50, App. to Pet.
for Cert. 164a, and (2) Ashcroft and Mueller “knew of, con
doned, and willfully and maliciously agreed” to that discrimi
nation, id., ¶ 96, at 172a. By my lights, there is no principled
basis for the majority’s disregard of the allegations linking
Ashcroft and Mueller to their subordinates’ discrimination.
I respectfully dissent.
Justice Breyer, dissenting.
I agree with Justice Souter and join his dissent.
I write separately to point out that, like the Court, I believe
it important to prevent unwarranted litigation from inter
fering with “the proper execution of the work of the Gov
ernment.” Ante, at 685. But I cannot find in that need
adequate justification for the Court’s interpretation of Bell

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Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U. S. 544 (2007), and Federal
Rule of Civil Procedure 8. The law, after all, provides trial
courts with other legal weapons designed to prevent un
warranted interference. As the Second Circuit explained,
where a Government defendant asserts a qualified immunity
defense, a trial court, responsible for managing a case and
“mindful of the need to vindicate the purpose of the qualified
immunity defense,” can structure discovery in ways that di
minish the risk of imposing unwarranted burdens upon pub
lic officials. See Iqbal v. Hasty, 490 F. 3d 143, 158 (2007).
A district court, for example, can begin discovery with lower
level Government defendants before determining whether a
case can be made to allow discovery related to higher level
Government officials. See ibid. Neither the briefs nor the
Court’s opinion provides convincing grounds for finding
these alternative case-management tools inadequate, either
in general or in the case before us. For this reason, as well
as for the independently sufficient reasons set forth in Jus
tice Souter’s opinion, I would affirm the Second Circuit.