McCuskey, other attorneys general sound alarm about Chinese drug risk

(Legal Newsline) – West Virginia Attorney General J.B. McCuskey has joined a 20-state letter to Secretary of State Marco Rubio alerting the administration to a grave national security risk to the pharmaceutical supply chain actively being exploited by Chinese-sourced businesses.

The Alabama-led letter identifies national security risks from dangerous pharmaceutical ingredients used in popular compounded GLP-1 drugs, including semaglutide, tirzepatide and retatrutide. In one instance, a business in China exploiting the gaps in oversight had direct ties to entities who manufacture fentanyl.

“Chinese businesses are exploiting an oversight gap and putting Americans’ health and safety at risk,” McCuskey said. “We are alerting the National Security Council so they can address this gap and take action to keep these dangerous ingredients from entering the country.”

In September 2025, the Food and Drug Administration authorized the creation of a “Green List” of suppliers, which has effectively given Chinese suppliers the ability “to ship unapproved, knock-off products to the United States without detention or inspection.”

As the letter states, despite efforts to verify the “true source, chain of custody, and downstream use of the ingredients in real time,” the Green List has become a proven laundering channel.

Specifically, Chinese company Harbin Jixianglong Biotech Co. (Harbin) was found to have purchased knock-off semaglutide from a non-Green List facility not registered with the FDA. Because Harbin was on the Green List, it was only after an on-site inspection that it was discovered Harbin had repackaged and relabeled the non-Green List products under Harbin’s name, changed the manufacturing and retest dates and distributed to the United States.

West Virginia joined the letter led by Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall that was also signed on to by attorneys general from Arkansas, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee and Utah.

This report was produced by Legal Newsline and distributed by The Center Square as part of a content-sharing agreement. Reach editor John O’Brien atjohn.obrien@therecordinc.com.

This story originally appeared on thecentersquare.com.