Maryland has called on a federal judge to dismiss big technology’s challenge to its levy on digital advertising, pointing to legal precedents validating the program as a legitimate tax rather than a penalty on companies such a Google and Facebook.
In a supplemental brief filed Nov. 19 by Attorney General Brian Frosh, the state pushed back on the tech industry’s recent assertions that Maryland’s first-in-the-nation Digital Advertising Gross Revenues Tax constitutes a penalty designed to punish a small group of companies “for purportedly causing ‘social ills.’” Frosh pointed to precedents from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth ...