I think the reporting by Bloomberg yesterday that Sessions is looking into a possible investigation into Google has gotten their attention.
Today they are finally responding to the report by Tucker Carlson that exposed an email by a Google employee that suggested Google tried to aid Hillary in getting elected.
Here’s their response via Fox News:
A spokesperson from Google hit back at claims of political bias on Wednesday.
“The employee’s email is an expression of her personal political views about the outcome of the 2016 election and those views do not reflect any official stance by the company,” the spokesperson told Fox News. “We have nearly 90,000 employees comprising a broad array of political affiliations. The email itself explicitly notes that she is speaking personally, and that Google’s efforts were non-partisan.”
In the last paragraph of the email, the employee writes that they are sharing “personal opinions.”
Voto Latino
The executive’s email also mentioned the tech giant’s support of Voto Latino—a nonprofit group cofounded by actress Rosario Dawson, according to its website—which seeks to “transform America by recognizing Latinos’ innate leadership.”
Although the email states that Voto Latino helped ferry voters to the polls in key states, something the Google employee labeled as a “silent donation,” a source familiar with the matter told Fox News that Google was unable to find a record of any donation to the nonprofit.
“Our election and voting information is made available to all Americans who search for it—it is not targeted to any locations or demographic groups. And contrary to reports, we made no donation—monetary, in-kind, silent or otherwise—to Voto Latino to drive people to the polls,” the Google spokesperson told Fox News.
I would point out that the email didn’t state specifically that it was a monetary donation. In fact it says that Google helped Voto Latino “create ad campaigns” to get hispanic voters to the polls.
The company also rejects that there is any bias against conservatives at all in Google’s products:
The California-based company also rejected claims that its pre-election actions were biased against conservatives—noting its work with the non-partisan National Voter Registration Day and its efforts to protect elections from hacking or digital attacks.
“The suggestion that Google’s products or actions are politically biased is simply wrong,” Google’s spokesperson said. “As we approach the midterm election, we will continue to ensure that our products and election efforts remain strictly non-partisan in nature. Our goal is to equip users with accurate, up-to-date information about their elections—not to support any particular candidate or ideology.”
I suspect that this won’t do much to stop the DOJ from investigating if it finds legal justification for it. And I doubt very seriously that many conservatives will just take Google’s word for it.