New Mexico Faces Off Against Facebook in Santa Fe Trial
New Mexico is taking Meta to trial in Santa Fe, pursuing its own massive payouts after rejecting a 47-state Cambridge Analytica settlement.
SANTA FE, N.M. — New Mexico is taking another swing at Meta Platforms Inc.
Jury selection begins Tuesday in Santa Fe as the state prepares to face off against Facebook’s parent company over its infamous 2018 user data scandal. It is the third time this year that the Silicon Valley giant has been dragged into a courtroom in the state capital. While most state attorneys general opted for quick, collective settlements, New Mexico’s legal team chose a lonely, aggressive path.
This trial, scheduled to run through Oct. 2 before District Judge Francis Mathew, marks the next chapter in a bitter legal fight that began half a decade ago. It centers on allegations that Facebook let political consultants hijack the private lives of hundreds of thousands of local voters.
Rejecting the Multistate Cash Out
Most of the country took a different deal.
In August, Meta agreed to a landmark $17 billion settlement with 47 states to resolve claims that its social media platforms harmed children. Buried deep inside that 130-page document sat a separate agreement. Under those terms, the tech giant agreed to pay nearly $460 million to settle lingering lawsuits over Cambridge Analytica, the defunct British political firm that harvested data from millions of voters.
Under that multistate deal, some states took home what amounted to pocket change. Alaska received about $4 million. Massachusetts secured over $18 million. The deal released Meta from all current and future claims related to the data breach.
New Mexico chose to walk away from those negotiations. State prosecutors believed they could secure a much larger payout on their own. They took a look at the math and said no.
“Attorney General Torrez declined to join the multistate litigation by other states and instead initiated its own case against Meta under New Mexico law,” said Lauren Rodriguez, chief of staff for the New Mexico Department of Justice.
A Winning Streak in the Desert
The state’s gamble has already paid off. Twice.
Earlier this year, New Mexico won two separate trials against Meta over child safety and exploitation claims. In March, a Santa Fe jury hit Meta with a $375 million civil penalty. Five months later, District Judge Bryan Biedscheid ordered the company to pay an additional $567 million to help repair the harm caused by its platforms.
In total, those cases secured $942 million for New Mexico’s children. State officials point out that this per-capita recovery is eight times higher than what they would have received from the multistate settlement. Now, they are trying to duplicate that success with the Cambridge Analytica case.
The Anatomy of a Data Harvest
This current lawsuit dates back to the fallout of the 2016 presidential election.
The state’s lawsuit, originally filed in 2021 by then-Attorney General Hector Balderas, alleges that Cambridge Analytica gathered private personal data from roughly 70 million Americans. Around 350,000 of those affected were New Mexico residents. The political consulting firm used that stolen data to target voters with hyper-specific digital advertisements.
New Mexico’s legal team argues that Facebook was not just a passive bystander. The lawsuit claims the social media platform had employees embedded within political campaigns and profited by selling advertising space directly to Cambridge Analytica and presidential candidates.
“Cambridge Analytica received millions of dollars from multiple presidential candidate campaigns to provide digital advertising services during the 2016 election,” the lawsuit alleges.
The state argues that Facebook violated the New Mexico Unfair Practices Act. They are seeking unspecified financial penalties available under the law.
Meta’s Defense and Federal Precedent
Meta has denied all allegations in court filings.
Its lawyers will likely argue that the company has already paid its dues to society. In 2019, Facebook paid a record-breaking $5 billion penalty to the Federal Trade Commission to resolve federal investigations into the Cambridge Analytica data leak. Meta has also settled the vast majority of private and state lawsuits related to the breach over the last two years.
But New Mexico officials argue that the federal fine did nothing to compensate individual states or help local voters recover from the breach. They want local accountability.
Legal experts are watching the Santa Fe trial closely. If New Mexico wins another massive judgment, it could change how other state attorneys general handle future tech litigation. The traditional model of states banding together to sign joint settlements might lose its appeal if individual states can secure eight times more money by going to court alone.
The trial begins with jury selection Tuesday morning at the First Judicial District Court in Santa Fe.
