Capitol Weekly’s Top 100: Larisa Cespedes

90. Larisa Cespedes

Larisa Cespedes is a partner at Miller, Cespedes & Associates (MCA), another one of Sacramento’s small-but-mighty boutique lobbying firms. MCA employs just three lobbyists but manages to represent 25 clients, including such big names as the American Beverage Association, Edison, Estee Lauder, FedEx, Phillips 66 and – oh yeah – Walmart. Not too shabby for a firm founded five years ago. But then Cespedes is widely recognized and respected as one of the hardest working people in the Capitol ecosystem. She also has the innate ability to enter into a tense situation and calm the waters while staying uncompromisingly fierce in the service of her clients across a varied array of issues, which she somehow still manages to also understand with depth. And all while doing it with a big belly laugh that you can hear a mile away. Cespedes previously spent a decade working for Lang, Hansen, O’Malley & Miller before launching MCA in January 2020.

Updated August 26, 2025