Tim Sparapani, one of Facebook’s first public policy hires inside the Beltway, has left the company, according to POLITICO.
Sparapani joined Facebook in April 2009 from the American Civil Liberties Union where he was a passionate advocate for individuals’ privacy rights. Neither Facebook nor Sparapani gave a reason for his departure. Sparapani did not immediately respond to an e-mail query at the time of this post.
As POLITICO notes, Sparapani leaves just as the social networking giant expands its presence within the Beltway significantly.
In May, the firm hired two former White House aides Joel Kaplan, President George W. Bush’s former deputy chief of staff and Myriah Jordan who worked with Kaplan in the White House.
Kaplan worked with Bush to enact the USA PATRIOT Act. When Sparapani was at the ACLU, he worked against the renewal of several key provisions of the legislation.
Facebook also recently hired former Clinton White House spokesman and founder of the Glover Park Group Joe Lockhart.
More recently the company expanded its DC and European policy staff with the hiring of Erin Egan as its senior policy advisor and director of privacy. Egan joins Facebook from the law firm of Covington & Burling. She is joining Facebook mid-October.
Another new staffer joining Facebook’s Washington DC offices this week is Louisa Terrell, who comes from the White House where she worked as a special assistant to the president for legislative affairs. She’ll be taking on Sparapani’s title of director of public policy.
Facebook also hired the long-time European tech policy expert Erika Mann last week to manage its Brussels office. Mann was a member of the European Parliament for 15 years and has spent her career immersed in the weeds of geeky internet policy issues. Facebook hired Mann away from the Computer and Communications Industry Association, a group that represents Silicon Valley companies’ legal interests in both Washington DC and Brussels.
