Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier on Friday widened his office's inquiry into potassium bromate, a dough additive, by issuing a civil subpoena to food distributor Performance Food Group, Inc.
Uthmeier announced the step at a news conference in Orlando. The subpoena reaches the company's Performance Foodservice warehouses in Orlando and Miami and asks for records going back to 2023, according to the attorney general's office and news reports.
Investigators want to know which products made with certain bromated flours were sold, who purchased those products and the flour itself, and whether buyers were told what the flour contained.
Four bleached, bromated bakery flours are named: Pillsbury Potentate High Gluten Flour, Pillsbury Best Bakers Patent Flour, Gold Medal All Aces Bakery Flour and Gold Medal Superlative Bakers Flour. The company has until Nov. 6 to turn over the records.
"Floridians have a right to know what was sold, who bought it, and whether anyone was told that these products contain a chemical much of the world has already banned," Uthmeier said in a statement. He described the distributor as a major buyer of the flour.
The attorney general's office said a subpoena does not on its own establish that the company broke any law, describing it as the next step in tracing where the flour went after it entered the state's restaurant and institutional supply chain.
How the inquiry began
The investigation opened in July, when Uthmeier subpoenaed General Mills under the Florida Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act. That request sought a list of bromate-containing products sold in Florida, the biggest purchasers from 2023 through 2026, the disclosures given to buyers, the schools that bought the products and any research on health effects.
FOX 35 reported that it is not clear whether General Mills has complied.
