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Administrator- Joined
- May 11, 2013
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- 24,882
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- Morganton, N.C.
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(The Guardian) Republicans have lost an election finance complaint against Google, in which they alleged the tech giant violated US law by deploying its spam filter against campaign emails, Ars Technica reports.
The Federal Election Commission (FEC) rejected a complaint filed jointly by the Republican National Committee (RNC), National Republican Senatorial Committee and National Republican Congressional Committee which alleged Google’s filtering of their emails represent an “illegal in-kind contributions made by Google to Biden For President and other Democrat candidates.”
Last week, the FEC ruled that there was “no reason to believe” Google had made an illegal contribution, nor that Joe Biden’s presidential campaign had accepted such a contribution. “The Commission’s bipartisan decision to dismiss this complaint reaffirms that Gmail does not filter emails for political purposes,” Google said in a statement to Ars Technica on Tuesday.
The Republican complaint cited a study from North Carolina State University (NCSU) that found “Gmail marks a significantly higher percentage (67.6 percent) of emails from the right as spam compared to the emails from left (just 8.2 percent).”
However, the FEC rejected that assertion, saying there were several limitations to the study, and “the NCSU Study does not make any findings as to the reasons why Google’s spam filter appears to treat Republican and Democratic campaign emails differently.”
Google’s trouble with the Republicans aren’t over. In October, the RNC sued the company, saying it is “throttling its email messages because of the RNC’s political affiliation and views.”
The Federal Election Commission (FEC) rejected a complaint filed jointly by the Republican National Committee (RNC), National Republican Senatorial Committee and National Republican Congressional Committee which alleged Google’s filtering of their emails represent an “illegal in-kind contributions made by Google to Biden For President and other Democrat candidates.”
Last week, the FEC ruled that there was “no reason to believe” Google had made an illegal contribution, nor that Joe Biden’s presidential campaign had accepted such a contribution. “The Commission’s bipartisan decision to dismiss this complaint reaffirms that Gmail does not filter emails for political purposes,” Google said in a statement to Ars Technica on Tuesday.
The Republican complaint cited a study from North Carolina State University (NCSU) that found “Gmail marks a significantly higher percentage (67.6 percent) of emails from the right as spam compared to the emails from left (just 8.2 percent).”
However, the FEC rejected that assertion, saying there were several limitations to the study, and “the NCSU Study does not make any findings as to the reasons why Google’s spam filter appears to treat Republican and Democratic campaign emails differently.”
Google’s trouble with the Republicans aren’t over. In October, the RNC sued the company, saying it is “throttling its email messages because of the RNC’s political affiliation and views.”
