The state's top lawyer builds a lawsuit assembly line against the White House, a tactic beloved and reviled on a strictly rotating basis

SACRAMENTO — Attorney General Paxton filed yet another lawsuit against the federal administration this week, one of dozens his office has launched since the President took power, in what allies describe as a heroic legal firewall and opponents describe as a partisan litigation machine that was reportedly being assembled months before anyone had voted.
The suits span elections, spending, data privacy and tariffs, and share a common architecture: a Democratic-or-Republican attorney general, an opposing-party President, and a press release drafted before the ink on the executive order has dried. The Press notes the office has become less a law firm than a subscription service, delivering a fresh constitutional crisis to supporters on a reliable schedule.
Supporters hailed the attorney general as the last line of defense against an lawless executive. Critics called him a rank partisan abusing his office to campaign in a courtroom. The Press's docket desk confirms that 'defending the rule of law' and 'weaponizing the justice system' are the same filing, stamped by the party of the President being sued.
Legal scholars observed that suing the other party's White House dozens of times is now a standard feature of the job in large states of both colors, and that the attorney general who does it is a hero at home and a villain one state over, often for the identical brief.
Asked whether the volume of litigation was itself political, the attorney general said he simply followed the law wherever it led, which this year, by remarkable coincidence, was straight at the President.
What actually happened: Democratic state attorneys general have sued the Trump administration roughly 100 times since January 2025, with California AG Rob Bonta alone participating in more than 80 cases spanning elections, federal funding, data privacy and tariffs; critics note the coordinated litigation strategy was organized well before the 2024 election.