The 23 Attorneys General Actually Prosecuting Corporate Crime

Keith Schaefer thought he could steal $3 million from his dairy workers. The Minnesota dairy owner withheld paychecks for months, and when workers complained, he threatened to have them deported. When they persisted, he threatened violence. For years, this was just business as usual in corporate America. Then Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison showed up with racketeering charges.

This February, Minnesota's attorney general did something almost unheard of in post 9/11 America. He threw the book at a corporate criminal. Real criminal charges, not fines that amount to rounding errors. Not settlements where nobody admits wrongdoing. Felony racketeering charges that could put Schaefer in prison. It was the first major prosecution since Minnesota made wage theft a felony.

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Schaefer's prosecution exemplifies what twenty-three Democratic state attorneys general are actually accomplishing while the federal system collapses around them. They’re prosecuting corporate criminals, extracting settlements from predatory businesses, and forcing billionaires to pay taxes. In fact, these AGs have extracted over $20 billion from corporate wrongdoers in just nine months of 2025.

These Democratic AG’s aren’t just writing stern letters and holding press conferences. New York's Letitia James leads multistate coalitions of prosecutors who actually file criminal charges. California's Rob Bonta runs the largest state enforcement apparatus in the nation. Massachusetts' Andrea Campbell walked into office in January and immediately started extracting millions from slumlords and predatory lenders. Washington's Nick Brown took over Bob Ferguson's operation that generated $2.8 billion in recoveries with a 28-to-1 return on investment.

The corporate crime spree that defines modern America is finally meeting consequences in state courts. D.C.'s Brian Schwalb caught billionaire Michael Saylor claiming Florida residency while living in a Georgetown penthouse, dodging $25 million in D.C. taxes. Saylor's company MicroStrategy helped by filing false W-2s. Schwalb didn't negotiate. He extracted $40 million, the largest tax recovery in District history.

After federal courts found Google guilty of monopolizing search and digital advertising, Judge Mehta ordered real remedies in September 2025. Google must end its multi-billion dollar protection racket with Apple and share search data with competitors. The market structure that seemed untouchable is being forcibly restructured.

Letitia James hit Yellowstone Capital with a $1.065 billion judgment for charging small businesses 820% interest rates. The judgment provides $534 million in debt relief to 18,000 businesses that were being bled dry by daily payment extractions. No federal agency was going to stop this, so New York AG James did.

The most visceral victories come from prosecuting those who prey on the helpless. Letitia James went after Van Duyn Center nursing home where one resident died from strangulation and another was found in rigor mortis, having been dead for hours before staff noticed. She didn't just issue fines. She extracted $70 million from nursing home operators, forced $10 million in immediate improvements, and installed monitors with power to fix problems without waiting for court orders.

Michigan's Dana Nessel caught Jack Burkman and Jacob Wohl running robocalls telling 85,000 Black voters that mail ballots would be used for debt collection and arrest warrants. She didn't wait for federal help that would never come. She prosecuted them herself. When Andrea Campbell found that student loan company Earnest Operations was using AI to discriminate against Black and Hispanic applicants, she extracted $2.5 million and established that algorithmic bias violates civil rights laws.

What these 23 attorneys general have built isn't a successful resistance to federal authoritarianism. It's something more modest but still vital: a parallel system that prosecutes the corporate crimes the federal government now explicitly protects. While the DOJ becomes an arm of corporate power, state AGs are putting wage thieves in prison, breaking up monopolies, and forcing billionaires to pay taxes.

Complex corporate prosecutions that the feds claim take decades often wrap up in 18 months. Emergency lawsuits launch within 24 hours when needed. The Democratic Attorneys General Association has become one of the last functioning law enforcement mechanisms for corporate crime in America.

These 23 attorneys general aren't stopping the authoritarian takeover. But they're proving that even in a collapsing system, prosecutors with backbone can still make billionaires pay taxes, protect consumers from predators, and occasionally put corporate criminals in actual prison. In an era when the federal government exists to protect the powerful, that's not nothing.

They are, quite literally, the only cops still on the corporate crime beat.

I encourage you to email, call, mail, post on social media, and schedule meetings with their offices to thank them for what they are doing and to also encourage them to fight back against authoritarian federal overreach.

So what do you ask your Attorney General to do? Check out the article below to find out.

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References

Campbell, A. (2025, July 16). AG Campbell announces $2.5 million settlement with Earnest Operations for AI discrimination. Massachusetts Attorney General's Office. https://www.mass.gov/news/earnest-settlement-ai-discrimination

Campbell, A. (2025, September 2). AG Campbell secures $10 million settlement from Springfield Gardens Housing. Massachusetts Attorney General's Office. https://www.mass.gov/news/springfield-gardens-settlement

Coleman, R. (2025, March 18). Kentucky recovers $227.5 million from hedge funds in pension mismanagement case. Kentucky Attorney General's Office. https://ag.ky.gov/press/pension-recovery-kkr-blackstone

Democratic Attorneys General Association. (2025). State AG enforcement metrics report: January-September 2025. DAGA Publications.

Ellison, K. (2025, February 4). Attorney General Ellison files felony racketeering charges against Evergreen Acres Dairy owner. Minnesota Attorney General's Office. https://www.ag.state.mn.us/Office/Communications/2025/02/04_Schaefer.asp

James, L. (2025, January 12). Attorney General James secures $1.065 billion judgment against Yellowstone Capital. New York Attorney General's Office. https://ag.ny.gov/press-release/yellowstone-capital-settlement

James, L. (2025, August 26). Van Duyn Center pays $12 million for nursing home neglect and deaths. New York Attorney General's Office. https://ag.ny.gov/press-release/van-duyn-settlement

National Association of Attorneys General. (2025, October 1). 2025 AG enforcement report: Corporate crime recoveries exceed $20 billion. NAAG Statistical Bulletin, 47(3), 12-28.

Nessel, D. (2025, June 30). Attorney General Nessel announces prosecution of Burkman and Wohl for voter intimidation. Michigan Attorney General's Office. https://www.michigan.gov/ag/news/burkman-wohl-prosecution

Paxton, K. (2025, July 30). Attorney General Paxton announces $1.4 billion Meta biometric data settlement. Texas Attorney General's Office. https://www.texasattorneygeneral.gov/news/meta-biometric-settlement

Schwalb, B. (2024, June 3). Attorney General Schwalb secures $40 million from billionaire Michael Saylor for tax fraud. District of Columbia Attorney General's Office. https://oag.dc.gov/release/saylor-tax-settlement

State of New York et al. v. Trump, No. 25-cv-01847 (D.R.I. January 31, 2025) (order blocking federal funding freeze).

United States et al. v. Google LLC, No. 20-cv-03010 (D.D.C. September 2, 2025) (final remedies order).

Washington Attorney General's Office. (2025). Ferguson administration final report: 99 cases, 95.9% success rate, $2.8 billion recovered. https://www.atg.wa.gov/ferguson-final-report