Google told House committee Trump-related search results were hidden due to bugs and errors, docs reveal

Google acknowledged to House investigators that information pertaining to former President Donald Trump’s attempted assassination was inadvertently blocked from appearing in autocomplete search results because its system was “out of date,” according to a letter unveiled Monday.

The House Oversight Committee Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government revealed the findings in a letter to Sundar Pichai, the Chief Executive Officer of Alphabet, and alleged that the tech giant may be “interfering” in the upcoming election by censoring information pertaining to the assassination attempt. Google’s counsel acknowledged an “error” to the committee that showed results for Harris instead of Trump and omitted information about Trump entirely in response to the search “President Donald,” claiming it was due to a “bug.”

#NEWS: @Jim_Jordan reveals non-public information on 𝐆𝐎𝐎𝐆𝐋𝐄’s issues with Search and Autocomplete surrounding the assassination attempt of President Trump.

🧵 THREAD: pic.twitter.com/Tz7TZq1BBy

— House Judiciary GOP (@JudiciaryGOP) August 5, 2024

Google users began flagging the search result discrepancies in late July when the autocomplete feature for “assassination attempt” omitted any information regarding the recent Trump shooting. Users also began noticing that Harris-related content was the top search result for Trump-related searches, leading some to speculate that the tech platform was intentionally censoring information about Trump.

“Recent reporting has indicated that Google may now be interfering in the 2024 presidential election by censoring information about former President Donald Trump’s ongoing campaign for the presidency, including relating to the July 13 assassination attempt on him in Pennsylvania,” the letter reads.

Alphabet, a parent company of Google, also admitted to the committee that autocomplete search results had not shown results related to President Trump in response to searches for “President Donald,” because of a “bug” in their software that has since been fixed by a recent update, the letter says. The committee said this was a “vague excuse” that left “many questions unanswered.”

The committee also questioned Pichai about why Google searches for Trump had produced search results and news stories relating to Vice President Kamala Harris. Alphabet had claimed that this “error” was the “result of its algorithm” that is programmed to automatically generate news topics “related to a Google Search inquiry,” according to the letter.

Can verify. @libsoftiktok @Google https://t.co/Qi5EgzPnVK pic.twitter.com/jmEL5iqZld

— Chip Roy (@chiproytx) July 28, 2024

“The company also noted that ‘predictions may be unexpected or imperfect, and bugs will occur,’” the report reads.

Since news of the apparent discrepancy first broke, various Republican lawmakers, including Sen. Roger Marshall, criticized Google for its alleged “censorship against conservative voices,” calling for an investigation into the platform.

“Google’s failure to provide suggestions related to the assassination attempt against President Trump on July 13, 2024, as part of its search function is yet another example of censorship against conservative voices and violates the intent of Section 230,” Marshall said in the letter. “Omitting suggestions to the most obvious and recent victim of an assassination attempt shows a willful discrimination against President Trump and users of your search engine.”

Google did not immediately respond to a request for comment from the Daily Caller News Foundation.

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