Google critic’s firing sparks backlash within New America ranks

The New America Foundation is facing substantial backlash from Democrats, academics, and journalists — including those within its own ranks — a week after it was revealed that Google pressure led to the firing of a prominent Google critic at the left-leaning think tank. A letter sent Sept 2 by 25 current and former members of the New America Fellows Program criticized the organization’s initial response.

The signatories include journalists such as George Packer and Patrick Radden Keefe of the New Yorker and Nikole Hannah-Jones of the New York Times, and scholars such as Brooklyn Law School’s Sabeel Rahman and Harvard’s Evgeny Morozov. “We are troubled by the initial lack of transparency and communication from New America’s leadership on this topic,” the letter states. “We remain deeply concerned about this sequence of events, and believe that better answers and clarity must be immediately forthcoming to assure us, and the outside world, that New America’s work is truly independent, now and going forward.”