Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is suing the makers of Tylenol, accusing the companies of “deceptively marketing” the drug to pregnant women despite being aware of the risks to the neurological development of unborn children.
Paxton is suing both Johnson & Johnson and Kenvue, two companies that make the over-the-counter drug, after the Trump administration recommended last month that pregnant woman avoid the drug due to alleged links to autism.
“Big Pharma betrayed America by profiting off of pain and pushing pills regardless of the risks. These corporations lied for decades, knowingly endangering millions to line their pockets,” Paxton said in a statement. “Additionally, seeing that the day of reckoning was coming, Johnson & Johnson attempted to escape responsibility by illegally offloading their liability onto a different company. By holding Big Pharma accountable for poisoning our people, we will help Make America Healthy Again.”
The lawsuit alleges that the companies were well aware of the dangers of acetaminophen, but marketed the drug as safe for pregnant women anyway. It also alleges that Johnson & Johnson violated the Texas Uniform Fraudulent Transfer Act by transferring liabilities to Kenvue in order to protect assets from lawsuits over the negative effect Tylenol was allegedly having on children.
“Despite being well aware of this fact, Tylenol was marketed as a completely safe pain medication for pregnant women, violating Texas’s consumer protection laws,” the statement reads. “The considerable body of evidence demonstrating these dangers was recently highlighted by the Trump Administration.”
In September, the Trump administration released guidance on consuming acetaminophens during pregnancy, suggesting that doing so dramatically increases the chance of autism or attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in unborn children.
“Scientists have proposed biological mechanisms linking prenatal acetaminophen exposure to altered brain development and adverse birth outcomes,” the White House announcement reads.
Tylenol denies any association between autism and acetaminophen.
“We believe independent, sound science clearly shows that taking acetaminophen does not cause autism,” Tylenol said. “We strongly disagree with any suggestion otherwise and are deeply concerned about the health risks and confusion this poses for expecting mothers and parents.”
The Texas lawsuit is the first on the state level after the Trump administration’s announcement on Tylenol last month.
RELATED: Texas Sues Tylenol Maker Over Claims It Failed to Warn Pregnant Women of Autism Risk
In announcing the new recommendation, Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Dr. Marty Makary cited three recent studies which suggest a correlation between acetaminophen use in pregnancy and childhood autism and ADHD. The findings of those studies, however, contradict the most comprehensive paper on prenatal acetaminophen use and neurological disorders, which was published in JAMA last year and found that the evidence of increased autism or other intellectual disabilities from acetaminophen usage disappears once researchers controlled for confounding variables by examining sibling pairs.
Written by Kamden Mulder for National Review ~ October 28, 2025