Sen Cruz Blasts Google for ‘Transparently Politically Motivated’ Move to Target Conservative Media Outlet

Senate Subcommittee on The Constitution Chairman Ted Cruz (R-TX) sent a letter to Google CEO Sundar Pichai raising concerns about Google's latest actions to censor political speech with which it disagrees. Following reports that The Federalist, a conservative media organization and publisher, would no longer be able to generate revenue from any advertisement served by Google Ads - allegedly because of a reader comment that violated Google's advertising policies - Sen Cruz wrote: "The recent actions of Google to ‘demonetize' a conservative media publisher, The Federalist, raise serious concerns that Google is abusing its monopoly power in an effort to censor political speech with which it disagrees." Sen Cruz also said it was deeply ironic that Google is financially punishing a website for speech that appears on its platform, as Google has defended section 230's grant of immunity to Big Tech by saying that 'the best way to protect online speech...is to allow platforms to set and enforce standards for an appropriate speech on their services, and to do so general free from...the threat of private litigation."