When you get a new car one of the last things you want to hear is that the brakes have a high chance of malfunctioning, and that, not only did the company know, but they have not put forward any effort to fix it. Well, that is exactly what happened to those who purchased the Hyundai Palisade SUVs between 2023 and 2025 according to a class action lawsuit. The lawsuit has just begun and nothing has been resolved as of now, but should this be true, this could be a major breach not just of road safety but also of trust between the company and customers.
The Hyundai Palisade class action suit
The case was filed by Camille Maldonado, a California resident who, on May 9 decided to bring the case to a California federal court. The allegation that she is making is that the Palisade’s anti-lock brakes or traction control systems do not work properly on uneven or rough roads and that instead of slowing down as expected, the brakes misread how fast the wheels are spinning and keep rapidly turning the brakes on and off. This causes the SUV to take longer to come to a stop, which is a serious safety concern.
This is especially worrisome considering that marketing materials for the Hyundai Palisade paints the car as being packed with safety features, yet this braking issue puts drivers and passengers at risk. Despite this, Hyundai has, according to her, done little to address the problem and many people are still driving these vehicles with the defective brakes because Hyundai has not yet decided to step up to repair them.
Given the situation, she believes that Hyundai has violated both state and federal consumer protection laws by putting defective vehicles on the market and then leaving customers to deal with the consequences. She also believes that this is on purpose and that while the problem may have taken a while to become apparent, Hyundai was aware of the problem long before these cars were even sold.
This is a serious accusation, as it would be directly accusing the company of willfully putting their customers at risk and profiting from the results, but allegedly the company learned about the defect during pre-production testing and from early complaints and warranty data and still they never warned consumers before putting the vehicles on the market.
Luckily as of right now there have been no reports of major accidents or deaths involving the brakes and the alleged failure, but if there was to be an accident and the allegations were proven to be true, Hyundai would be in a lot of trouble and the class action suit would be the least of the company’s worries.
Since the cars were sold all over eh country, the plaintiffs are asking the court to let them represent everyone in New York and Ohio who bought or leased a Palisade from the 2023 to 2025 model years as they are also alleging that Hyundai violated its written warranty, misled consumers, and broke consumer protection laws in New York and Ohio. They are looking for damages and reimbursement for the money consumers spent on vehicles they believe were sold under false pretenses.
The legal team handling this brake lawsuit is led by Trinette G. Kent from Lemberg Law LLC. The official case is titled *Maldonado, et al. v. Hyundai Motor America*, Case No. 8:25-cv-00983, and it’s being handled in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California.
This is not the only legal trouble facing the Palisade, another class action investigation is looking into reports that seat belts in 2020–2023 Palisade models can randomly come unlatched while the vehicle is in motion, which is also quite dangerous and if proven could be another heavy blow for Hyundai.