I applied for the role the first day that it was posted and I was contacted by the recruiter 5 days after. Later that week I had the initial phone screen with her which went well but at the end, with full transparency she informed me that the team was in the later interview stages with an internal candidate, but she would reach out to the hiring manager to confirm. Not really understanding why they would interview me if they were already in the process of interviewing/hiring an internal candidate until it was brought to my attention that companies legally are required to interview external candidates. Needless to say, they moved forward with the internal candidate.