In what’s being hailed as one of the largest state victories against a corporation in American history, Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, has been ordered by a New Mexico judge to pay the state $25 billion. The ruling came after a jury found Meta guilty of misleading Facebook users about its privacy and content moderation policies, per Reuters.
On October 21, 2026, Judge Francis Mathew wrote in his order following the jury’s verdict, “Facebook’s wrongdoing — over the course of years and systematically broadcast to the public — goes to the heart of Facebook’s core business practices.”
New Mexico State Attorney Says Meta Ruling Should Be a ‘Clear Warning’ to Tech Companies
In 2021, New Mexico’s attorney general, Raúl Torrez, sued Meta amid the discovery that the political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica obtained personal data from as many as 87 million Facebook users via a third-party app.
Judge Mathew noted that New Mexico state law would have allowed for a penalty of more than $219 billion, but he reduced the figure to $25 billion. All of that money will be channeled to the state’s education budget, since the New Mexico constitution says that’s where fines for violations of consumer protection laws must go, according to GMA.
Torrez called the ruling “one of the largest, if not the single largest, state verdict against a company in American history,” adding, “We may have paid for the construction of schools for the next 100 years.”
Torrez told reporters at a press conference after the ruling, “Today’s judgement from a state, which admittedly is not very big in terms of population, should be a clear warning to everyone in Big Tech, Mr. [Mark] Zuckerberg, Meta, social media companies, indeed AI companies.”
Representatives for Meta said in September that the company would appeal the jury’s decision, but Torrez insisted on October 21 that his state intends “to do everything in our power to make sure that those resources are eventually delivered” to fund New Mexico schools.
New Mexico Flew Solo in Going After Meta After 48 States Settled
In the press conference on October 21, Torrez told reporters that Facebook “has, frankly, lied to its users, to consumers, and to people all over the world, about the extent to which they can control the information that they make available on their social media profiles.”
In August, 48 states reached a joint $17 billion settlement with Meta over issues including cultivating social media addiction among youth. When it came to deceiving users around privacy, Meta agreed to pay $459 million as part of that settlement, per The Hill. New Mexico was one of only two states that opted not to partake in the broader suit.
“The fact that we received a judgment today that is less than the total statutory max shouldn’t be mistaken for the larger message,” Torrez told reporters, noting that 48 states “are sharing $459 million for the conduct at issue, and New Mexico just received a $25 billion judgement. So I’ll leave it to you to determine whether and to what extent that counts as a victory.”
Judge Orders Meta to Pay $25 Billion for Deceiving Facebook Users About Their Privacy