Updated 8/22/25 to include additional lobbying disclosures
In one of the few victories for public interest advocates this year, lawmakers voted down an amendment to Trump’s spending bill that would have preempted states from regulating AI for 10 years. As The Lever reported in May, this AI moratorium would have been especially helpful to rental software company RealPage, which is (still) facing a deluge of bans on their algorithmic rent-setting software enacted by local (and possibly soon state) governments.
As The Lever reported, RealPage executives have long donated to the National Multifamily Housing Council, the largest landlord lobby in Washington. NMHC, in turn, specifically lobbied on “risks and opportunities posed by artificial intelligence and other emerging technologies on rental housing financing, development, and property operations,” in the first quarter of 2025.
But NMHC isn’t the only vehicle RealPage has to influence lawmakers–the company has spent $130,000 this year to “provide advice and counsel on algorithmic pricing issues” to the House and Senate via lobbying firm Polaris.
RealPage’s private equity owner, Thoma Bravo, spent $200,000 in 2025 enlisting Ballard Partners to represent the company on “issues related to competition in the housing industry,” though the current disclosures don’t indicate lobbying took place in the first two quarters of 2025. Ballard Partners is uniquely connected to the Trump administration: the firm sourced multiple of his appointees, including Department of Justice head Pam Bondi.
Thoma Bravo has also spent $220,000 thus far in 2025 paying lobbying firm Tiber Creek Group to lobby the Department of Justice on “issues related to competition in the housing industry” as well. The DOJ’s Antitrust Division is handling the government’s investigation and lawsuit against RealPage. That means RealPage’s owner has spent, in total, $420,000 lobbying on housing issues thus far in 2025.
Reporting indicates that this might not be the last we see of a proposal to ban state and local AI laws. And the Department of Justice recently settled with one of RealPage’s clients, Greystar, for sharing “competitively sensitive data” about the landlord’s 950,000 rental units across the country with RealPage and other competitors. The data was used to generate pricing recommendations using RealPage’s algorithms. With Greystar and the DOJ reaching a settlement, RealPage could attempt to influence the DOJ, a la HPE, to possibly secure a lighter settlement for its anti-competitive actions. We’ll continue to track RealPage’s efforts to influence the executive and legislative branches across the board.
Photo: President Donald Trump holds a press conference with Attorney General Pam Bondi and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche in the James S. Brady Press Briefing Room on Friday, June 27, 2025. (Official White House Photo by Abe McNatt)