Meta is opening its wallets and building trenches in preparation for a political battle over antitrust regulations that, if lost, could wreak havoc on its ailing core business.
Though Meta and even CEO Mark Zuckerberg have grudgingly advocated for small reforms in the past, the company is increasingly relying on the American Edge Project, a little-known lobbying firm, to spearhead its opposition to widely popular policy proposals that supporters say will strengthen competition in the digital economy.
A 501(c)(4) 990 filing from AEP reveals the group got a single $4 million payment between December 10, 2019, and October 31, 2020, according to a recent investigation by The Tech Transparency Project (TTP). That gift coincided with Meta (then Facebook) telling the Washington Post that it had given to AEP. The authors of the research contend that these facts suggest Meta not only funds AEP, but also may have founded it.
“With Facebook’s financial backing, American Edge Project has succeeded in establishing the specter of a grassroots, bipartisan façade to disguise its corporate goals,” the report’s authors write.
In the video below, Frances Townsend, who served as a White House Counterterrorism and Homeland Security Advisor under George W. Bush, explains the firm’s view on technology.
On the other hand, tech watchdog groups such as the Tech Oversight Project have criticised AEP, stating that it “obscured its backers” by portraying itself as a grassroots NGO despite receiving full-throated support from Meta. The Tech Oversight Project says that since its inception, AEP has coordinated with and collaborated with Facebook to fiercely resist popular anti-trust legislation and expand Big Tech’s influence.
Also read the report, “After spending the first year of its public-facing existence trying to lift the public’s opinion of American tech firms, AEP can now push back against any proposed bipartisan antitrust legislation with a supposedly bipartisan counterpoint: that the success of Big Tech and the successes of the American people are inextricably intertwined.”
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