Outside lobbying firms working for Anthropic reported $910,000 in income from the company for the third quarter of 2026, against $150,000 a year earlier, about six times as much, by our count of the federal LDA.gov lobbying disclosure filings. Eight outside firms reported paid work for Anthropic in the quarter, against two in the third quarter of 2025.
The largest was Ballard Partners, which reported $380,000 for the quarter, 41.8% of the eight-firm total by our arithmetic. Bloomberg Law ran the headline “Lobbyists Rake in Record Revenue for Influencing AI Policy in Q3” on Monday; we could not read the full article, so the figures here come from our own pull of the filings.
The key insight: Outside lobbying firms reported $910,000 in third-quarter 2026 income from Anthropic across eight firms, against $150,000 from two firms a year earlier, about six times as much, and Anthropic accounts for 74.6% of the 26.9% rise in outside-firm income across six AI clients, by our count of LDA.gov filings.
In the third quarter of 2025, the filings show two paid outside firms on Anthropic’s account: Aquia Group at $60,000 and Continental Strategy at $90,000. In the third quarter of 2026 the list reads Aquia Group at $60,000, Avenue Solutions at $60,000, Ballard Partners at $380,000, Continental Strategy at $150,000, Fierce Government Relations at $90,000, Kountoupes Denham Carr & Reid at $60,000, Navigators Global at $60,000 and Thorn Run Partners at $50,000.
The step up came earlier in the year. Ballard Partners filed its registration for Anthropic on 10 April 2026 and reported $130,000 for the first quarter and $380,000 for each of the second and third quarters. By our arithmetic, Anthropic’s outside firms reported $900,000 for the second quarter, so the third-quarter total of $910,000 is up $10,000 on the quarter.
Ballard’s third-quarter report lists its issue area as defense and describes the work as “Advocacy regarding US policy regarding AI.” The government bodies it names include the White House Office, the National Security Council, the Department of Defense, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, the House and the Senate. Its listed lobbyists include Brian Ballard and Amaryllis Fox Kennedy.
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Income reported by outside lobbying firms from six AI clients in the third quarter of 2025 and 2026, from LDA.gov filings, one filing per firm, excluding in-house reports and on-behalf-of sub-contract filings. Anthropic’s outside firms reported $910,000, against $150,000 a year earlier; the six-client total rose 26.9%, by our arithmetic.
Six AI Clients, One Outlier
We ran the same count for five other AI companies. Outside firms reported $310,000 from OpenAI in the third quarter, against $290,000 a year earlier; $460,000 from Nvidia, against $290,000; $1,042,500 from Meta, against $936,250; $1,160,000 from Google, against $1,215,000; and $920,000 from Microsoft, against $902,500.
Across the six clients, outside-firm income rose from $3,783,750 to $4,802,500, or 26.9%, by our arithmetic. Anthropic’s $760,000 increase accounts for 74.6% of the six-client rise. The count takes one filing per firm, leaves out each company’s own in-house report, and leaves out sub-contract filings whose client line reads “on behalf of” another firm, so the same payment is not counted twice.
Connecting the Coverage
On 21 October we reported the companies’ own in-house filings in Nvidia’s third-quarter lobbying jump to $2.15 million, including Anthropic’s $2,110,000, more than double the $1,010,000 of a year earlier. In-house and outside figures are not added together here, because a company’s in-house total can include what it pays outside firms.
As we read the filings, Anthropic built most of this outside roster in the first half of 2026: Ballard Partners registered on 10 April, and the eight-firm total of $910,000 in the third quarter is $10,000 above the second quarter’s $900,000, by our arithmetic.
As we read Ballard Partners’ report, the largest piece of the account is pointed at national-security bodies: it lists defense as the issue area and names the National Security Council, the Department of Defense and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence among the bodies lobbied.
Ballard Partners, third-quarter 2026 LD-2 report for Anthropic, specific lobbying issue
“Advocacy regarding US policy regarding AI.”
Three Implications
FOR ANTHROPIC Eight outside firms reported paid work for Anthropic in the third quarter of 2026, against two a year earlier, and Ballard Partners reported $380,000 of the $910,000, according to the LDA.gov filings, 41.8% by our arithmetic.
FOR RIVAL AI LABS Outside firms reported $310,000 from OpenAI, against $290,000 a year earlier, and $460,000 from Nvidia, against $290,000, according to the filings.
FOR THE BIG PLATFORMS Outside-firm income from Google fell to $1,160,000 from $1,215,000, while Meta rose to $1,042,500 and Microsoft to $920,000, according to the filings.
The framework argues: “The governance layer sits at the intersection of capability, regulation, national security, access control, and geopolitical alignment.”
As we read it, Anthropic’s largest outside lobbying account, which names the National Security Council, the Department of Defense and the intelligence director’s office, sits in that same layer. The framework is the owner’s argument and does not discuss these filings.
The filing form asks for a good faith estimate of income rounded to the nearest $10,000, and the filings do not show what any firm achieved. We did not read Bloomberg Law’s article beyond its headline and standfirst, so we cannot say how it defines AI-policy lobbying or which firms it counted; our six-client count is narrower than an industry-wide total.
Searches by client name can miss filings made under a variant of a company’s name, and amendments filed after 2 November would change the totals. We did not contact Anthropic or the firms for this piece.
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Eight outside lobbying firms reported $910,000 in third-quarter income from Anthropic, against $150,000 from two firms a year earlier, about six times as much, by our count of LDA.gov filings. Ballard Partners reported $380,000 of it. Across six AI clients, outside-firm income rose 26.9%, and Anthropic accounts for 74.6% of the increase.
A note on sourcing. This piece relies on our own pull of LDA.gov lobbying disclosure filings for the third quarters of 2025 and 2026, and on Ballard Partners’ third-quarter report for Anthropic. Totals, shares and growth rates are our arithmetic, using one filing per outside firm and excluding in-house and on-behalf-of sub-contract filings. Bloomberg Law is cited for its headline only.
Gennaro Cuofano is a CRO and tech executive who has worked in AI since late 2015, starting with bringing NLP, natural-language generation, voice and chatbot products to the marketing industry. His background is in law and finance: he holds a Master's degree in Law and an International MBA with an emphasis on corporate finance (LUISS Business School and the University of San Diego, 2012), and worked as a financial analyst at a real-estate investment firm in San Diego and as an assistant controller. His work focuses on business model strategy, business engineering and, more broadly, structural analysis: how companies make money, read from their own filings. He created FourWeekMBA and leads research there and at The Business Engineer, his newsletter on AI and business strategy, with over 95,000 subscribers and more than 1,000 published analyses. His writing has also appeared on Entrepreneur (for example, How to Digitize a Family Business in Europe) and HackerNoon. Find him on LinkedIn and Substack. See how we source.
