Sources: Facebook is quietly helping to launch American Edge, a political advocacy group in Washington, to battle regulators trying to rein in the tech industry
The organization, called American Edge, arrives at a time when the industry is facing withering antitrust scrutiny in Washington.
Washington PostTony Romm
Context & Ripple Effects
With antitrust investigations gathering steam in Washington, Facebook is reportedly seeding American Edge, an advocacy group designed to look like independent grassroots pushback against regulation. The move extends a playbook the company has run before: in 2017 it helped Secure America Now target ads for a conservative nonprofit campaign, and within a month of this report Amazon, Facebook, and Google were revealed to be covertly funding political groups to blunt antitrust action.
First-order effects
Facebook gains a nominally independent vehicle for arguing against rein-in-the-tech-industry regulation, letting it lobby without its own brand attached to every message.
Lawmakers and regulators weighing antitrust action now face organized opposition that presents itself as local business and consumer sentiment rather than corporate advocacy.
Second-order effects
The covert-funding model spreads across the industry: Amazon and Google's parallel political spending shows rivals can ride the same proxy groups rather than each building their own.
Because the group's funding traces back to the platforms, any disclosure or leak risks backfiring on Facebook at exactly the moment critics argue animosity toward the company could push the Biden administration into more proactive measures.
Third-order effects
If the pattern holds, major tech policy fights get fought through manufactured grassroots coalitions, raising the bar for transparency rules around who funds political advocacy.
By 2022 American Edge was still operating as Meta's vehicle for opposing antitrust reform, suggesting proxy-advocacy structures outlast the news cycles that create them and become standing infrastructure in regulatory battles.
The trend: Facing antitrust scrutiny, the largest platforms are shifting from direct lobbying to proxy advocacy groups that manufacture the appearance of grassroots opposition.
The board of Facebook's new dark money group will include a former FEC commissioner who doesn't believe in campaign finance regulations, if you want a hint of what kind of policies they'll oppose. https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ... https://twitter.com/...
SCOOP: Facebook is quietly helping to set up a new pro-tech advocacy group to battle Washington. It's called American Edge, a 501(c)(4) dark money group similar in structure to the kind of orgs the NRA runs, and it'll blitz the airwaves with ads. https://www.washingtonpost.com/ .…
Facebook dives deeper into the muck of political corruption and by setting up its own NRA. Congratulations to everyone who still thinks this company is redeemable. https://twitter.com/...
‘Regulate us!’ Zuckerberg in Feb 2020. Today: 'Facebook is working behind the scenes to help launch a new political advocacy group that would combat US lawmakers & regulators trying to rein in the tech industry, escalating Silicon Valley's war with DC'↘️ https://www.washingtonpos…
Facebook is one of the big-tech entities behind American Edge, a new lobbying group in DC to fight antitrust regulators and push back against lawmakers trying to rein in Big Tech. https://boingboing.net/...
On one hand, tech is so bad at lobbying that I don't know what they would do besides spend way more money. On the other, this will likely result in Facebook hiring a dark-arts PR firm that accidentally sets off some dire new scandal https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ...
SCOOP: Facebook is quietly helping to set up a new pro-tech advocacy group to battle Washington. It's a dark money group with a former congressman and governor and others, reflecting tech's escalating war with the feds https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ...
SCOOP: Facebook is quietly helping to set up a new pro-tech advocacy group to battle Washington. It's called American Edge, it's similar in structure to the kind of orgs the NRA runs, and it'll blitz the airwaves with ads. https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ...
“Over the 1st 3 months of 2020, Facebook shelled out an additional $5.2 mil, making it the 7th-biggest spender in the nation's capital x all industries... Along w antitrust enforcement, Facebook has sought to battle back efforts to regulate the way it moderates content online.” h…
Facebook often says it wants governments to make decisions on difficult issues (such as regulating political ads). It writes detailed memos on its positions. https://about.fb.com/... Then it sets up lobbying efforts to delay or stop it happening. https://www.washingtonpost.com/ .…