Why It Matters

CrowdStrike Inc. filed an amendment to its fourth quarter 2025 lobbying disclosure, reporting $370,000 in in-house lobbying expenditures. The amendment lists no specific issues lobbied and cites no legislation, making it one of the more opaque filings in the company's recent congressional lobbying records.

The cybersecurity company has been navigating the fallout from its July 2024 global IT outage, which triggered congressional hearings and raised questions about software update protocols for critical infrastructure vendors. At the same time, it earned a FedRAMP High Authorization in March 2025, expanding its eligibility for sensitive federal contracts. That combination of regulatory exposure and market opportunity gives the company a strong incentive to maintain an active Washington presence.

By the Numbers

This filing is an amendment to CrowdStrike's fourth quarter 2025 in-house report, filed by Erik Peterson, the company's sole in-house lobbyist. The amended disclosure reports $370,000, matching the amount listed in the original fourth quarter 2025 in-house report. The Erik Peterson lobbying disclosure reflects a broader pattern of elevated spending. Peterson's filings alone total $2,150,000 across eight disclosures dating back to the second quarter of 2024.

CrowdStrike's lobbying operation is not limited to in-house activity. The company has retained multiple outside firms concurrently, including Van Scoyoc Associates, Cornerstone Government Affairs, DLA Piper LLP (US), and FGS Global (US) LLC. Across all firms and in-house activity, CrowdStrike filed at least five separate disclosures for the fourth quarter of 2025 alone.

Who Is Doing the Work

Peterson is the only lobbyist listed on this amendment. His congressional staff background is directly relevant to CrowdStrike's core lobbying focus. As reflected in congressional lobbying records, Peterson served as a senior professional staff member on the House Homeland Security Committee across multiple congresses, and previously worked in the office of Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX-21). His background as a Lamar Smith staff lobbyist and Homeland Security Committee veteran positions him well for a company whose primary federal audience is that same committee.

Peterson's total service on the Homeland Security Committee spanned the 112th through 117th Congresses, giving him deep institutional knowledge of the panel that has led oversight of CrowdStrike's operations and the broader federal cybersecurity landscape.

The Agenda

This particular amendment lists no specific issues lobbied and no legislation. Because it is an amendment to the original fourth quarter 2025 in-house filing, it may reflect a technical correction rather than a substantive change in lobbying priorities.

The original fourth quarter 2025 in-house report filed by Peterson cited a range of active priorities, including:

The most recent in-house filing for the first quarter of 2026 shifted focus toward fiscal year 2027 appropriations, including the fiscal year 2027 Financial Services and General Government Appropriations Act, the fiscal year 2027 National Defense Authorization Act, and the fiscal year 2027 Homeland Security Appropriations Act.

Broader Context

In May 2025, members of the House Homeland Security Committee, including Rep. Mark Green, Rep. Andrew Garbarino and former Rep. Eric Swalwell, visited CrowdStrike's facilities to discuss cybersecurity and critical infrastructure protection, as well as how Congress could support public-private partnerships.

In April 2026, Dmitri Alperovitch, co-founder and former CTO of CrowdStrike, testified before Congress at a hearing on China's campaign to steal America's AI edge. Alperovitch told lawmakers that "whoever fields the best models running on the best infrastructure will likely win not just the AI race, but the 21st century," framing AI competition with China as a defining national security challenge.

On the contracting side, OpenSecrets reported that CrowdStrike was on track for a record year of federal lobbying spending following the 2024 outage. Federal budget pressures have added uncertainty. Nextgov/FCW reported an 11 percent year-over-year decrease in civilian agency contract obligations from fiscal year 2024 to fiscal year 2025, while Federal News Network noted that cybersecurity leaders were working to demonstrate return on investment amid DOGE-related budget scrutiny.

A Senate Judiciary Committee release in December 2025 also surfaced declassified materials containing allegations about CrowdStrike's role in past intelligence matters, though the underlying document noted those allegations originated from Russian intelligence sources.

The Bottom Line

This amendment adds little new information to CrowdStrike's lobbying record. The blank issues field and absence of cited legislation suggest it is a technical filing rather than a strategic shift. The broader picture, drawn from the company's full set of disclosures, shows a well-resourced and multi-front lobbying operation focused on federal cybersecurity policy, appropriations, and defense authorization legislation, with a congressional staff member turned lobbyist at the center of its in-house effort.

Access the Legis1 platform for comprehensive political news, data, and insights.