The company said in a statement that it was “not aware of how The Shark Group would gain access to our respirators as it is not an authorized distributor of 3M products or one of our channel partners.” It added that 3M’s list prices “are far lower than what appears to have been offered to the State of Florida.”

The statement added: “3M is filing lawsuits in cases where third parties use the company’s name, brand or trademark to engage in price gouging of N95 respirators and other illegal and unethical behavior. We have no knowledge of whether that occurred in this situation. We are happy, though, to assist law enforcement authorities if they wish to look into this matter.”

A spokesman for the Florida attorney general said on Wednesday that the office did not have enough information to comment on the matter.

In a statement on Wednesday, Mr. John criticized news media reports about the deal and defended his involvement.

“Let me be clear,” he wrote, “proper reporting would have shown I did not set any prices and that my team worked with the State of Florida to: 1. Save lives 2. Help vet the overwhelming amount of incoming PPE offerings based on my manufacturing expertise and guide them how to best do this 3. Play a pivotal role to stop pricing gouging, and successfully identify potential fraud and theft of PPE product to protect taxpayers funds.”