Attorneys general have increasingly used their power to pursue investigations targeting organizations whose work conflicts with their political views. Texas’ Paxton is among the most aggressive.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has repeatedly used the state’s powerful consumer protection laws to investigate organizations whose work conflicts in some way with his political views or the views of his conservative base, an analysis by ProPublica and The Texas Tribune found.

Paxton has been particularly aggressive among an increasing number of attorneys general who are using consumer protection statutes to investigate not only predatory lenders or unscrupulous car dealers but also political targets, experts say. ProPublica and the Tribune identified more than a dozen instances in the past two years in which Paxton has used the state’s consumer protection office to demand records from organizations with which he disagrees politically.

  • ConstableJelly@midwest.socialEnglish
    2·
    6 months ago

    13 legal actions total regarding:

    • Prohibiting trans youth care: 6
    • Vaccine skepticism: 2
    • Limiting immigration services (including for victims of torture): 2
    • Censoring content: 2, both of which to my layman understanding would be blatant violations of the first amendment rights of Yelp and Media Matters if brought to suit. The Yelp investigation in particular is mind-boggling.

    For a brief second I thought the last might have actual merit:

    On March 28, the attorney general’s Consumer Protection Division contacted Spirit AeroSystems, a Boeing parts supplier, seeking documents and communications related to airplane product defects.

    But of course:

    The attorney general’s investigative letter also demanded records “that Spirit relies on to substantiate its claim that a diverse workplace improves product quality,” enhances performance and spurs the company to make better decisions. In a news release, Paxton’s office said his office was investigating “whether those commitments are unlawful or are compromising the company’s manufacturing processes.”

    You can see by how many of these organizations immediately acquiesced to the state’s “concerns” how transparently Paxton is using state power vexatiously to just…bully compliance with his political ideology. Paxton is a D-grade villain.