Google on Tuesday denied the accusations laid out by U.S. President Trump earlier today, responding to his latest Twitter tirade with a prepared statement emailed to media outlets that strongly denies any notion of Search having a left-leaning bias or being politicized in any shape or form. The sole goal of the Google Search team is to ensure users are always served with “the most relevant answers,” the company said. “Search is not used to set a political agenda,” Google argued, adding that it’s always improving its flagship product so as to ensure it’s working in an optimal manner, rejecting the idea that it ever altered its results with the goal of affecting any “political sentiment” in the country or abroad.
The President publicly wondered whether Google’s supposed censorship is illegal and threatened to take action against the company, albeit without elaborating on the matter. The critics of the current administration described his latest remarks as a conspiracy theory, whereas President Trump remains adamant that Google is censoring conservative voices online. The head of the state has been complaining about what he perceives is unfair media coverage since being on the campaign trail in 2016 and has repeatedly threatened the likes of Twitter and even Amazon over the matter, with the e-commerce giant being targeted due to the fact that its founder and CEO Jeff Bezos is the owner of The Washington Post, a high-profile outlet critical of Trump that has been reporting on the current administration’s scandals with no restrains from day one.
The President’s economic adviser Larry Kudlow recently clarified the White House will perform “some analysis” of the Search results but did not elaborate on the matter. Last month, President Trump defended Google after Alphabet’s subsidiary was hit with a historic fine in the European Union due to antitrust violations linked with its Android licensing practices. Twitter was previously threatened with a similar probe after it was accused of not surfacing accounts of some prominent Republicans but it’s presently unclear whether any such investigation was conducted by the White House. Separately, Google is still facing pressure to crack down on misinformation campaigns seeking to polarize the American public and potentially influence the outcome of the forthcoming mid-term elections taking place in early November.