by Vianna Davila

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This article is co-published with The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan local newsroom that informs and engages with Texans. Sign up for The Brief Weekly to get up to speed on their essential coverage of Texas issues.

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.

It’s unclear how many similar cases might be underway in Texas. The attorney general’s office told the news organizations it hasn’t consistently maintained a list of the division’s demands to examine records. The agency is also fighting to withhold certain records, citing state public information law exceptions.

The attorney general’s office did not respond to detailed questions about the investigations, including how many remained open.

Date investigations began: February 2022

Stated basis for the investigation: In August 2021, then-state Rep. Matt Krause, a Republican who the same year launched an investigation into school library books that dealt with topics like sexuality and race, requested an opinion from the attorney general’s office about whether certain gender-affirming treatments, including puberty-blocking drugs, were akin to child abuse. After Paxton agreed that they were in a February 2022 nonbinding legal opinion, Gov. Greg Abbott directed the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services to investigate parents who authorized such medical care for their children. The next month, the attorney general demanded to review two pharmaceutical companies’ records, including a list of all hormone blockers they sold and notes from meetings with Texas health care providers discussing those products. Paxton said he wanted to determine if the drug manufacturers had “deceptively advertised and promoted” those hormone blockers without disclosing the potential risks to children and their parents.

Response: AbbVie and Endo Pharmaceuticals declined to comment for this story. In 2022, however, an Endo spokesperson told the Tribune that the company was cooperating with the attorney general’s investigation and did not promote its medications for off-label reasons, which can mean the drug is used for a medical condition it’s not approved by the Food and Drug Administration to treat.

Status: Paxton’s office did not answer questions about the status of the investigations.

Date investigation began: February 2022

Stated basis for the investigation: The attorney general’s office launched an investigation of GoFundMe days after the company took down a $10 million fundraising campaign launched by Canadian truckers who were protesting vaccine mandates for drivers crossing the U.S. border. GoFundMe said it removed the campaign, which was raising money for truckers’ fuel costs, food and lodging, in response to law enforcement reports of violence connected to the protests. GoFundMe initially posted a statement in 2022 saying the company would refund donations upon request and donate any remaining funds to charities chosen by the event organizers. The company then decided to refund all donations in response to donor feedback. Paxton said in a news release he would investigate GoFundMe for initially planning to shift the funds to other charities.

Response: A GoFundMe spokesperson recently told ProPublica and the Tribune in an email that the company has “clear terms of service that outline acceptable use, and when a fundraiser violates those terms it is removed from our platform.” The spokesperson said the company cooperated with Paxton’s inquiry but did not elaborate on what that entailed.

Status: Paxton’s office did not answer questions about the investigation’s status.

Date investigations began: May 2022 and November 2022

Stated basis for the investigation: Paxton’s Consumer Protection Division launched a probe into the nonprofit Texas Bar Foundation in May 2022, following allegations by Republican U.S. Rep. Troy Nehls, from Richmond, that the organization was donating to entities that encourage and fund illegal immigration. The foundation issues grants to nonprofits that work on legal issues, including those that provide assistance to underserved people, according to its website. Months later, Paxton launched investigations into three organizations that had received funding from the foundation: American Gateways, Equal Justice Center and Tahirih Justice Center. Paxton said his office was looking into whether the money the organizations received was “being used to exacerbate the current crisis at the border.”

Response: A spokesperson for American Gateways said the organization provides legal services for immigrants, refugees and victims of torture, including human trafficking survivors. The organization provided the attorney general’s office the records the state requested as part of its investigation, including correspondence with the Texas Bar Foundation, “which demonstrates our compliance under........

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