Paxton suing Gerber and Nestlé over alleged arsenic and lead in baby food

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is suing Gerber Products Co. and its parent company, Nestlé USA Inc., alleging the Gerber baby food products contain dangerous levels of toxic metals, according to a Wednesday press release from his office.

“Gerber promised parents its food was safe and rigorously tested. Its own tests showed toxic metals in the food. When a company makes promises about what parents feed their babies, I will hold it accountable to ensure those promises are kept,” Paxton said in the release.

The 68-page lawsuit filed in Collin County, Texas, alleges that 67 batches of Gerber’s rice flour contained more than nine times the level of arsenic allowed by the federal government and that the company’s products also had excessive amounts of lead and cadmium.

According to the release, Gerber allegedly rarely tested for mercury and selectively tested ingredients rather than the finished products.

The lawsuit, brought under the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act, claims that Gerber’s safety claims on its packaging are at odds with the test results, which are relegated to a QR code on the back of products.

“A code on the back of the jar does not cure a false promise on the front,” the release said.

Gerber has disputed the claims in a written statement to ABC News’s local station in Austin , saying that its products meet the Food and Drug Administration’s limits for heavy metals. The company added that while heavy metals cannot be completely eliminated from the products, Gerber works to reduce them through ingredient sourcing, supplier requirements and testing.

The lawsuit comes weeks ahead of the November midterm elections where Paxton will face state Rep. James Talarico (D) in a close race for a seat in the Senate. The intense race involving attacks via campaign ads from both parties has quickly turned into a pivotal one in the country .