Donald Trump has that criminal prosecution demanded by Google because the company’s Internet search engine displays a disproportionate number of “bad stories” about him. For his rival, the Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris, only hits for positive articles would be displayed, Trump explained on Friday in his online service Truth Social.
Trump did not provide any solid evidence for his claim. A conservative group had previously criticized the hits that Google showed when entering the keywords “Donald Trump presidential campaign 2024”. This report only examined “a single rare search term on a single day a few weeks ago,” Google told the AFP news agency. But in this search, too, the websites of both presidential candidates were among the first results displayed.
The company, which does not disclose its search algorithm, has always denied influencing search results to benefit political candidates. What is known is that popularity and publication date play a role in the ranking of results.
Trump has repeatedly made debunked false claims in the past, including about alleged election manipulation in the 2020 presidential election, in which he lost to President Joe Biden.
