Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced Thursday the state was suing the pharmaceutical giant Pfizer for allegedly misrepresenting the effectiveness of its COVID-19 vaccine and attempting to silence public discourse on the vaccine.

Paxton claimed the company's assertion that the vaccine possessed 95% efficacy against infection was highly misleading and that the deception was reenforced by the company silencing those on social media who tried to speak out. The 95% figure came from the company's two-month clinical trial, but it was warned that vaccine protection could not accurately be predicted beyond two months.

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“We are pursuing justice for the people of Texas, many of whom were coerced by tyrannical vaccine mandates to take a defective product sold by lies,” Paxton said in a statement. “The facts are clear. Pfizer did not tell the truth about their COVID-19 vaccines. Whereas the Biden Administration weaponized the pandemic to force illegal public health decrees on the public and enrich pharmaceutical companies, I will use every tool I have to protect our citizens who were misled and harmed by Pfizer’s actions.”

The lawsuit claims the company violated the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act and is requesting that the company be barred from “making representations about the efficacy of its COVID-19 vaccine” as well as “coordinating with social media platforms to silence truthful speech about Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine efficacy.” It is also seeking more than $10 million in civil penalties.

Pfizer rejected the lawsuit in a statement to Fox Business, claiming the suit had "no merit."

"Pfizer is deeply committed to the well-being of the patients it serves and has no higher priority than the safety and effectiveness of its treatments and vaccines," Pfizer said in its statement. "Since its initial authorization by FDA in December 2020, the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine has been administered to more than 1.5 billion people, demonstrated a favorable safety profile in all age groups, and helped protect against severe COVID-19 outcomes, including hospitalization and death. The representations made by the company about its COVID-19 vaccine have been accurate and science-based."

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More than 366 million doses of Pfizer’s original COVID-19 vaccine have been administered in the United States, according to federal data.

The lawsuit follows Paxton’s investigation into Pfizer and other vaccine manufacturers that was announced earlier this year, including an investigation into the Johnson & Johnson and Moderna vaccines.