Peter Thiel Gave Money to Attorney General Going After Google - Bloomberg

Deeply dubious donations; also see Missouri Opens Antitrust Investigation Into Google (NYT)

"Hawley, a Republican, unveiled a probe into Alphabet Inc.’s Google for favoring its own products in search results, citing the similar case in the European Union that resulted in a record fine. His subpoena is the most significant case against Google in the U.S. since the Federal Trade Commission picked up, then dropped, a competition case in 2013.

Thiel made a $100,000 contribution in 2015 to Hawley for the attorney general race, and gave two more $100,000 donations in 2016, according to Missouri state campaign finance filings. Hawley won the election and was sworn in on Jan. 9, 2017.

Thiel, an early investor in Facebook Inc., has criticized Google for years. In 2012, he sparred with then-Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt on stage at a conference, calling the company’s search engine a monopoly. “It’s quite legal to have a monopoly as long as you don’t abuse it," he added. In his recent book, "Zero to One," Thiel argued Google was a monopoly and said every company should want to be one."

Peter Thiel Gave Money to Attorney General Going After Google - Bloomberg