Google Among Top Lobbying Spenders in 2014

In its bid to preserve net neutrality and reform patent legislation, Google spent a total of $17.5 million on lobbying in the past year. According to the Center of Responsive Politics, the search giant itself shelled out a record $16.8 million to make its influence known in Washington D.C., while subsidiary Motorola Mobility spent another $690,000.

That makes Google the seventh largest lobbying spender in the United States overall and the biggest spender among all corporations - the top six spots are all taken by interest groups such as the Chamber of Commerce or the National Association of Realtors.

The only other companies that single-handedly spent enough to make the Top 10 in 2014 are Comcast, which lobbied heavily for approval of its $45 billion merger with Time Warner Cable and Boeing, which ramped up its expenditure to push for reauthorization of the Export-Import Bank of the United States.