Capitol Weekly’s Top 100: Larisa Cespedes

No. 94 Larisa Cespedes

Larisa Cespedes is a partner at Miller, Cespedes & Associates (MCA), one of Sacramento’s small-but-mighty boutique lobbying firms. MCA employs just three lobbyists but represents an impressive roster of clients, including the American Beverage Association, Southern California Edison, Estée Lauder, FedEx, Phillips 66 and Walmart. Not too shabby for a firm that has firmly established itself as one of the Capitol’s most effective boutique shops. Cespedes is widely recognized as one of the hardest-working people in the Capitol ecosystem. She has the rare ability to walk into a tense situation, lower the temperature and still advocate fiercely for her clients across an exceptionally broad range of issues. Colleagues know she’s done the homework long before the meeting begins. And somehow she still manages to do it all with a big belly laugh you can hear from down the hall. Cespedes previously spent a decade with Lang, Hansen, O’Malley & Miller before helping launch MCA in 2020.

Updated August 11, 2026.