Trump slams Google over claims of bias
Says searches are unfair
Google, Facebook and Twitter drew another round of criticism from President Trump yesterday, with claims the search giant is rigging its results and a top White House aide saying the administration is “taking a look” at Google searches.
“I think Google is really taking advantage of a lot of people. And I think that is a very serious thing and it is a very serious charge,” Trump said yesterday. “Google and Twitter and Facebook, they are really treading on very, very troubled territory and they have to be careful.”
Yesterday morning, Trump tweeted without evidence that Google search results produced stories overwhelmingly from “Left-Wing Media.” The claim appeared to have stemmed from an unscientific study by a littleknown website that claimed 96 percent of results for “Trump news” come from liberal sources. The article categorized nearly every single mainstream news outlet as “liberal.”
“Google & others are suppressing voices of Conservatives and hiding information and news that is good,” Trump tweeted. “They are controlling what we can & cannot see.”
Later yesterday, Larry Kudlow, Trump’s top economic adviser, told reporters the administration is “taking a look” to see if Google’s search results are subject to any federal regulations.
In response, Google said its search algorithms are based on providing relevant results to the user.
“Search is not used to set a political agenda and we don’t bias our results toward any political ideology,” the company said in a statement. “We continually work to improve Google Search and we never rank search results to manipulate political sentiment.”
Still, Google’s search ranking algorithm remains private, and it is unclear how the company produces its results. On all sides of the political spectrum, there is unease with the lack of regulation and oversight over algorithms and software that is responsible for ranking content on countless websites.
Google does employ thousands who are tasked with reviewing a news source’s authority, based on major awards like Pulitzer Prizes and clearly labeled advertising. If a website is deceptive, the reviewers are told to give it a low score. Higher-ranked news sources are generally listed above lower-ranked sources.
In recent months, Trump and other conservatives have routinely argued that conservative opinions and voices are being stifled and censored on social media. The debate has intensified after conspiracy theorist Alex Jones was banned by a number of platforms, including Facebook. According to reports, his pages were taken down for including and encouraging hate speech.
Jacob Groshek, a communications professor at Boston University, said it is unlikely Google would be discriminating against conservatives, simply because it would not be financially beneficial.
“The Google algorithm is designed to give you information that you want,” Groshek said. “I do not believe the Google algorithm is rigged in favor of any political party.”