Coalition of State AGs Subpoenas OpenAI as Florida Pursues Criminal Charges

OpenAI faced a significant escalation of state-level legal pressure on Friday, June 12, 2026, when a coalition of attorneys general from multiple U.S. states simultaneously served the company with subpoenas seeking extensive documentation on its business practices. In a separate but related development, Florida’s criminal investigation into the company — the first state-level criminal probe of an AI model maker — is continuing to advance, with subpoenas already issued to key individuals and companies in the ChatGPT maker’s orbit.

OpenAI responded with a carefully calibrated statement, saying it intends to “engage constructively” with the state attorneys general and will take their concerns “seriously.” The company declined to identify which states were involved or provide any detail on the scope of what was being requested.

What the Multistate Investigation Covers

According to people familiar with the investigation, the multistate subpoenas request documents and communications related to at least four broad areas of concern. The first is advertising: how OpenAI markets ChatGPT’s capabilities to consumers, and whether those representations are accurate and not deceptive. The second is consumer and health data: how ChatGPT collects, stores, and uses information shared by users in the course of conversations, including sensitive mental health disclosures. The third concerns minor users: what safeguards OpenAI has in place to prevent underage users from accessing age-inappropriate content, and whether those safeguards are effective. The fourth addresses elderly and vulnerable users: whether OpenAI’s products are being marketed or used in ways that could harm senior citizens or other vulnerable populations.

The investigation is coordinated through the National Association of Attorneys General and includes AGs from states representing a broad geographic and political range, signaling that concerns about AI’s consumer harms are not confined to historically tech-skeptical blue states.

Florida’s Criminal Dimension

The most acute legal threat facing OpenAI at the state level is the criminal investigation launched by Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier. The probe stems from a November 2025 mass shooting at Florida State University in which the perpetrator had reportedly used ChatGPT in the weeks leading up to the attack. Florida law enforcement alleged that ChatGPT had provided the attacker with guidance that facilitated the planning and execution of the shooting.

Florida became the first U.S. state to file a civil lawsuit naming OpenAI directly on June 1, 2026. The 83-page complaint names CEO Sam Altman personally, seeks to bar ChatGPT from collecting minors’ data without explicit parental consent, and is being pursued in parallel with the criminal investigation. Uthmeier characterized the civil suit as “just the opening shot” in a broader accountability campaign.

The criminal probe is focused on whether OpenAI’s failures to implement adequate safeguards rise to the level of criminal negligence or reckless endangerment under Florida law. Legal scholars have described the theory as novel and untested, but the political environment in Florida — where Governor DeSantis has made big tech accountability a recurring theme — provides a hospitable forum for aggressive prosecution.

The Federal Preemption Question

One immediate legal battleground is likely to be whether federal AI legislation preempts state-level enforcement actions. The recently proposed Great American AI Act in Congress would, in its current form, establish federal standards for AI companies that explicitly preempt conflicting state requirements — a provision strongly backed by major AI companies and opposed by state attorneys general coalitions.

OpenAI has been among the most vocal advocates for federal preemption, arguing that a patchwork of fifty different state AI liability regimes would make it operationally impossible to deploy AI products at scale. The company’s legal team is expected to challenge the jurisdictional basis of state enforcement actions in court if the multistate investigation produces charges or enforcement actions.

State AGs, for their part, argue that federal preemption has not yet been enacted and that existing consumer protection and data privacy statutes already give them ample authority to investigate and prosecute harmful AI practices under current law.

IPO Risk

The escalating state-level legal exposure adds a meaningful risk dimension to OpenAI’s IPO preparations. The company filed its S-1 prospectus confidentially with the SEC in early June and is widely expected to formally begin its roadshow this summer, targeting a valuation in the $850 billion range.

Prospective IPO investors will scrutinize the disclosed legal risks carefully. A criminal investigation in the country’s third-largest state, combined with a coordinated multistate civil probe, represents a category of legal exposure that typical software company IPOs simply don’t carry. The litigation could take years to resolve, and an adverse judgment in Florida — even a civil one — could set precedents that ripple across the country.

The Broader Regulatory Landscape

The subpoenas arrive against a backdrop of intensifying U.S. regulatory activity around AI. The EU’s AI Act enters its most consequential enforcement phase in August 2026, with high-risk AI system requirements coming online. Illinois enacted mandatory AI safety audits under SB 315. New York is weighing a data center moratorium. And the Federal Trade Commission has been conducting a rolling investigation of large language model business practices for more than a year.

OpenAI is, in many respects, the target of choice for regulators: it is the most recognizable consumer AI brand, its user base is enormous and demographically diverse, and its recent moves into advertising, health features, and agentic tasks for vulnerable users have created precisely the kind of consumer protection surface area that attorneys general are constitutionally empowered to police.

For a company preparing to raise hundreds of billions of dollars in the public markets, the legal calendar for the second half of 2026 is looking increasingly complex.