Texas has filed a lawsuit against Gerber Products Company and Nestlé USA, accusing the companies of deceiving parents about toxic heavy metals found in Gerber baby food. The 68-page suit, filed October 9 in Collin County District Court, seeks civil penalties that could exceed $10 million under the state's consumer protection law.
According to KVUE, Texas is pursuing statutory fines of up to $10,000 per violation under the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act, along with restitution and legal fees. As reported by KVIA, Attorney General Ken Paxton said Gerber's own test results showed dangerous levels of arsenic and lead in its products. Paxton, who is also running in the Texas U.S. Senate race against Democrat James Talarico, brought the claims under the state's deceptive trade practices statute.
What Paxton Says the Testing Found
Per Paxton, Gerber rice flour batches tested between 2017 and 2019 contained more than nine times the arsenic allowed by the federal government in bottled water. Gerber carrots, he alleges, contained 17 times the bottled-water limit for cadmium, while Gerber sweet potato products contained nearly 10 times the bottled-water limit for lead, according to KVIA's reporting.
Paxton also alleges that Gerber rarely tested its products for mercury and tested selected ingredients rather than the finished food babies actually eat. Federal health agencies have ranked arsenic as the substance posing the greatest potential threat to human health among the metals in question, with lead ranked second and mercury third. Neither lead nor inorganic arsenic has an established safe level for a baby.
QR Codes Draw Scrutiny From State Prosecutors
The lawsuit takes particular aim at how Gerber disclosed its testing. The company posts test results behind a QR code on its labels, but heavy metal levels reportedly remained unchanged in the food after Gerber began doing so, even as it continued to claim its baby food was safe on package fronts. The QR codes link consumers to Gerber's test results.
Texas prosecutors argue that passive digital disclosures are not enough if unsafe ingredients remain in production, and that marketing food as pure or recommended by pediatricians constitutes consumer deception when internal tests reveal elevated levels of lead, arsenic, and cadmium compared to drinking water standards, per the Office of the Texas Attorney General.
Gerber Pushes Back, Citing FDA Compliance
In its official response to the filing, Gerber disputed the lawsuit's claims, maintaining that its baby food complies with all FDA safety limits. The company said naturally occurring heavy metals in soil cannot be completely eliminated, though it works to minimize them through strict supplier controls and testing, the station's report notes.
That defense lines up with FDA guidance. Under its Closer to Zero initiative, the agency set recommended lead action levels in baby food at 10 parts per billion for pureed fruits and vegetables and 20 parts per billion for single-ingredient root vegetables and dry infant cereals, according to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Exposure to heavy metals can pose neurological risks.
A Multi-Year Investigation and a Contrasting Settlement
The lawsuit follows an industry-wide investigation Paxton's office launched in August 2025, when it issued Civil Investigative Demands to several leading baby food manufacturers to review their internal heavy metal testing standards. Not every company under scrutiny ended up in court: in September 2026, baby food brand Plum Organics reached a voluntary agreement with the Texas Attorney General's Office, becoming the first manufacturer to formally commit to strict heavy metal limits matching FDA and European Union standards, along with public batch-testing web disclosures.
Texas prosecutors also point to how a competitor responded to similar findings years earlier. Beech-Nut Nutrition recalled its infant rice cereal in June 2021 and permanently exited that market after Alaska state lab testing found elevated inorganic arsenic, according to the U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Reform. Gerber, by contrast, issued no recalls or public warnings despite similar test results, the committee's findings state.
The broader scrutiny of baby food heavy metals traces back to a February 2021 congressional report from the House Subcommittee on Economic and Consumer Policy, which first exposed widespread contamination across major commercial brands and found that manufacturers routinely tested unmixed ingredients rather than finished products.
