New Mexico’s $25 Billion Meta Verdict Rewrites the Playbook for State Attorneys General
The Unfair Practices Act's per-violation math creates new leverage for states targeting Big Tech
A New Mexico jury didn’t just slap Meta with a $25 billion penalty last month. It handed every state attorney general in the country a loaded weapon.
The verdict rests on the state’s Unfair Practices Act, a statute that allows $5,000 per violation. Multiply that by 43 million misleading statements — the jury’s count — and the math gets terrifying for any platform operating at Facebook’s scale. Judge Francis Mathew ultimately capped the award at $25 billion, well below the statutory maximum of $219 billion. But the mechanism remains intact.
“This changes the calculus entirely,” said Monte Mann, a business litigation partner at Armstrong Teasdale. “State consumer protection laws were designed for local car dealers and door-to-door salesmen. Nobody contemplated applying them to a company that makes 43 million representations to users in a single state.”
New Mexico Attorney General Raúl Torrez filed the suit in 2021, alleging Meta misled users about data access and content moderation. The case traced back to Cambridge Analytica, which harvested data from up to 87 million Facebook users without consent for Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign. But the trial wasn’t really about 2016. It was about 26 specific statements Meta made — 26 of 29 examined — that jurors found misleading.
Meta’s chief legal officer, C.J. Mahoney, called the ruling a “tax on speech” and vowed appeal. The company argues the penalty makes it “all but impossible to do business in the state of New Mexico.” Legal observers call that leverage. “Meta isn’t leaving New Mexico,” Mann said. “But the threat forces a settlement conversation that didn’t exist last week.”
Texas and California are watching closely. Both have investigated Meta’s data practices under their own consumer protection statutes. Neither has gone to trial. The New Mexico verdict — and the jury’s willingness to find millions of violations — creates pressure to escalate.
Meta shares closed at $697.52 Wednesday, up 0.47%. The market has priced in appeals, not payment. Reuters contributed to this report.
