The controversy over Google’s autocomplete feature surrounding searches related to the attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump has reignited allegations of censorship and political bias by Big Tech. After Mark Zuckerberg’s recent admission that the Biden/Harris administration pressured Meta to censor conservative content and influence elections, many are wondering if the White House is again trying to meddle with freedom of speech and public opinion.
Meric Sentuna Kalaycioglu
2 September 2024
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Mark Zuckerberg’s amazing admission in a letter to the Republican-controlled House Judiciary Committee on 27 August 2024 makes it official: Democrats have been pressuring Big Tech to censor content to influence public opinion and elections.
According to Zuckerberg, the Biden administration and the Biden-Harris campaign „pressured“ Meta into „censoring” content during the pandemic and to censor the Hunter Biden laptop story before the 2020 presidential elections. Zuckerberg writes to Committee Chair Jim Jordan (R-Ohio): „It’s since been made clear that the reporting [on the Hunter Biden laptop] was not Russian disinformation, and in retrospect, we shouldn’t have demoted the story.” Lying in connection with a Congressional investigation can lead to five years in prison.
A poll conducted by the New Jersey-based Technometrica Institute of Policy and Politics in mid-2022 showed that 79 percent of Americans believe that President Donald Trump would have won the 2020 elections if the Hunter Biden laptop story had been allowed to be published in October 2020 before the presidential election. The Hunter Biden laptop story showed that then Vice President Biden was helping his son’s business dealings in Ukraine. Since then, both the New York Times and the Washington Post have admitted that the laptop story was in fact authentic and not Russian disinformation.
Zuckerberg’s admission gives credence to the Twitter Files, which were released from December 2022 through March 2023 by journalists Matt Taibbi, Bari Weiss, Lee Fang and others. These Files demonstrated Twitter’s liberal bias in content censorship. The Files showed how the Biden campaign pressured Twitter to suppress the Hunter Biden laptop story leading up to the 2020 presidential election. The Files also showed how conservative voices were systematically blacklisted by Twitter.
In the weeks leading up to Zuckerberg’s groundbreaking admission, Google’s search autocomplete feature has been at the center of another case of suspected censorship concerning the phrase “Trump assassination attempt.” Initially, searches related to the attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump did not appear in Google’s autocomplete suggestions.
The fault in Google’s search engine was first noticed by users who took note that Google’s search engine appeared to block or omit autocomplete suggestions related to the assassination attempt. Although Google has since fixed the problem and the relevant terms now appear in the autocomplete feature, the sequence of events has fired conspiracy theories surrounding the assassination attempt on President Trump on 13 July. Many are now asking whether the US Government (USG) is again stifling freedom of speech by erasing the internet’s memory of the attempted assassination.
Initially, as reported by Newsweek and The New York Post, several commentators suggested that Google might be attempting to control the narrative surrounding the incident. The claims gained traction online, with accusations that the tech giant was engaging in censorship. In an interview that President Trump gave to Fox Business host Maria Bartiromo on 2 August 2024, Trump accused Google of unfairly targeting conservatives and vowed to take action against the company should he return to the White House.
Google clarified that it had not taken any manual action to remove references to the Trump assassination attempt from its search results and blamed the search algorithm. The tech giant argued that the search algorithm did not want to show violent or harmful content. This excuse is unconvincing and skepticism remains high that the omission was a deliberate act.
The timing of the Google autocomplete incident has led to widespread speculation about the tech giant’s motives. Some have suggested that Google might be acting in coordination with government agencies to obscure details of the Trump assassination attempt. This theory now seems plausible after Zuckerberg’s admission of the Biden administration’s previous election meddling and censorship of conservative voices.
The theory of direct USG meddling and censorship continues to gain ground after the White House and its political appointees in the US Secret Service and FBI continue to block and stall the bipartisan Congressional investigation of the Trump assassination attempt, frustrating lawmakers on both sides of the aisle.
Shortly before the autocomplete issue gained traction, Kimberly Cheatle, then Head of the Secret Service, faced significant criticism during a Congressional hearing for obstructing the Congressional investigation. Both Democrat and Republican Representatives criticized her refusal to disclose key details about the agency’s response, which was perceived as an attempt to shield the Secret Service from accountability. Since Biden refused to fire her, Cheatle was forced to resign by Republican and Democrat lawmakers. Kimberly Cheatle is a Biden appointee with close ties to the Biden family.
Meanwhile, FBI Director Christopher Wray continues to be criticized for his Agency’s handling of information on Trump’s assassination attempt, fueling speculation of a cover-up. Trump has since announced a new independent Presidential Commission on Assassination Attempts should he win the Presidency in November.
Although a fact-check by the Associated Press (AP) found little evidence to suggest a deliberate conspiracy by Google, Big Tech companies – Meta (Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp) and X (formerly Twitter) – have now admitted that the Biden administration actively approached them to censor content unfavorable to the Democrats. And, until very recently, all Big Tech companies denied any involvement by the USG.
Meta, X and Google have the power to influence elections and public opinion. Zuckerberg’s recent admission of censorship by the Biden-Harris administration/campaign and the Twitter Files make it plausible that Google’s search engine bias is not the mere result of its algorithm, but a concerted effort to influence public opinion and silence freedom of speech leading up to the 2024 Presidential election.
