The story is at The Hill, I just wanted a chance to snark a bit.
And mention that, in an effort to bypass the Austin city council which has not backed down in their confrontation with Uber (and Lyft) the Ubester is now spending serious money at the Texas legislature.
From the Austin Chronicle:
Lege for Sale?
Uber and Lyft splurge on lobby to deregulate themselves
If you don’t like the laws, buy some new ones. That’s not an option for most of us, but mega-corps Uber and Lyft have deep pockets and few scruples. If Austin officials and voters are not for sale, maybe state legislators will prove more agreeable.
That’s the message of the latest “Lobby Watch” from Texans for Public Justice, which reports that the two major “rideshare” companies (motto: "You share, we collect") have spent up to $5.5 million lobbying since 2014. That’s on top of the more than $10 million (mostly Uber’s) they spent last spring to impose and then lose an Austin deregulation referendum. In the wake of that humiliating defeat, they decamped the city and lay siege to the Capitol...MORE
As was said in the intro to January's "Uber tripled its lobbying efforts in 2016":
Just a reminder, there is more than one way to lobby.I'm thinking it may be worth revisiting Welcome to Uberville, Uber wants to take over public transit, one small town at a time.
The numbers cited here are just the declarable dollars spent at the federal level.
In addition there is the money spent at state capitals and for lobbyists at the local level.
Then there's the big money. The best example was probably Austin, Texas where Uber and Lyft spent millions on local political advertising.
Finally there are the political campaign donations which are not as large as the political advertising but do get the attention of the recipients....
