Flock Safety, the surveillance company whose network of cameras lets police search records of drivers’ movements across the country, has hired new lobbyists who help raise large sums of money for House Democrats.
The company retained Invariant, a Washington lobbying firm whose team on the account includes major Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) fundraisers Nicole Venable, Kenny Roberts, and Joel Richard, according to federal disclosures. The lobbyists will be working for the company to push policymakers on the “use of public safety and surveillance technology,” according to the registration filing.
Flock is turning to Democratic fundraisers to press its case as some of the party’s lawmakers seek to curb the company’s surveillance network. Earlier this month, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) proposed legislation that would broadly prohibit federal use of automated license plate readers and cut off some federal funding to state and local governments that use them.
Flock’s hiring of Invariant was reported Thursday by Politico Influence as part of the company’s expansion of its lobbying operation. The firm’s registration, filed Sept. 24, lists Aug. 10 as the effective date.
Disclosures from the DCCC indicate that Venable, Roberts, and Richard have raised more than $2 million in combined bundled contributions since 2024, according to a Sludge review. Bundled contributions are donations from other individuals or organizations that the party committee credits a lobbyist with raising. In the first six months of 2025 alone, the DCCC credited each of the three with raising nearly $300,000. Venable was also credited with $71,500 in bundled contributions to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC) over the same period.
