Just two weeks before opening arguments in its blockbuster antitrust trial with the Federal Trade Commission, Meta hired its first new lobbying firm in nearly two years. The tech giant brought on Mehlman Consulting, a bipartisan shop with deep Capitol Hill ties, including four former senior Republican staffers and one former FTC liaison to Congress.
The hiring comes alongside record spending: Meta reported spending $8 million on federal lobbying in the first quarter of this year, its highest quarterly lobbying outlay ever.
