WV Democrats Condemn Attorney General McCuskey's Attack on First Amendment Rights

For Immediate Release October 30, 2026

Federal Judge Halts Subpoenas Targeting Environmental Advocacy Groups; Pushkin Says Attorney General Is Acting Like the “Thought Police”

“Thought Police”

CHARLESTON, WV — The West Virginia Democratic Party today condemned Attorney General J.B. McCuskey's investigation of the West Virginia Rivers Coalition and 350.org after U.S. District Judge Joseph R. Goodwin issued a temporary restraining order blocking the Attorney General from enforcing subpoenas demanding nearly a decade of the organizations' internal communications, records, and information about their supporters.

In his ruling, Judge Goodwin delivered a damning rebuke of the Attorney General's use of state investigative authority against organizations engaged in constitutionally protected advocacy.

“The State's chief legal officer, who has publicly condemned that advocacy, now demands to know how they reached their views and who stood with them. The First Amendment forbids a State from using its investigative power that way, and I will not allow it while this case is pending,” Goodwin wrote.

The Attorney General issued the subpoenas under West Virginia's Consumer Credit and Protection Act, a law intended to protect consumers from unfair and deceptive business practices. Yet Judge Goodwin noted that McCuskey identified no consumer who had been cheated, no sale, and no purchase made in reliance on anything either organization had said.

Instead, the Attorney General demanded years of internal communications, draft publications, fundraising records, and information about the organizations' relationships with other groups and supporters.

West Virginia Democratic Party Chair Mike Pushkin said the investigation represents a dangerous use of government authority against organizations whose political and policy positions the Attorney General opposes.

“Make no mistake about it: The Attorney General hasn't identified a single consumer who was cheated, a single sale that was influenced, or a single purchase made because of anything these organizations said,” Pushkin said. “He's using a consumer protection law to investigate organizations because he doesn't like their position on environmental issues. It's that simple.”

“Attorney General McCuskey is so desperate to pander to a narrow political constituency that he's willing to run roughshod over the First Amendment to do it,” Pushkin continued. “His office is essentially saying that the government can serve as the thought police, investigating what organizations believe, how they arrived at those beliefs, and who supports them.”

The West Virginia Rivers Coalition and 350.org are nonprofit advocacy organizations whose work includes protecting water resources, addressing environmental concerns, and advocating for policies they believe will preserve West Virginia's natural resources.

Pushkin emphasized that the constitutional protections at issue extend far beyond environmental policy or partisan differences.

“Every West Virginian and every American should be deeply concerned about the precedent this sets,” Pushkin said. “If the Attorney General can use the investigative powers of his office to intimidate organizations because he disagrees with their views, what's to stop a future Attorney General from doing the same thing to The Coal Association, The Chamber of Commerce, religious organization, or a home school advocacy group? The First Amendment doesn't just protect speech the government agrees with. It protects the right to disagree with the government.”

Opposition to the Attorney General's actions is not limited to Democrats or environmental advocates. Jason Huffman, state director of the conservative Americans for Prosperity-West Virginia, publicly defended the organization's free speech rights despite disagreeing with its policy positions.

“While we disagree with the environmental left's rhetoric, there's one thing we should agree on: they have a right to say it. Government has no prevailing interest in leveraging state-led investigations to put a thumb on the scale of a fight over policy or politics,” Huffman stated.

Pushkin said Huffman's comments demonstrate that the dispute transcends traditional political divisions.

“When Democrats and Americans for Prosperity are defending the same constitutional principle, that ought to tell you something,” Pushkin said. “You don't have to agree with the West Virginia Rivers Coalition or 350.org on a single environmental issue to recognize that government officials have no business investigating people simply because they disagree with their political advocacy. The Attorney General should be forced to repay every cent The Rivers Coalition and 350.org have spent on defending against this frivolous action.” 

“This is a brazen attempt at censorship,” Pushkin added.  Attorney General McCuskey would do well to remember what John Stuart Mill wrote in On Liberty: 

“The peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is, that it is robbing the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth: if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error.”

“West Virginians deserve an Attorney General who protects their constitutional rights, not one who uses the power of his office to threaten those rights,” Pushkin concluded. “The government doesn't get to decide which opinions are acceptable, and it doesn't get to investigate citizens simply because those citizens dare to disagree.”

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