Google admits voting feature favored Harris over Trump

Google has admitted that its search engine provided US voters with data on where they could vote for Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris but failed to inform them of where they could cast a ballot for Republican Donald Trump.

Social media users noticed that when the phrase “Where can I vote for Harris?” was entered into Google, they were allowed to input their address to determine the closest voting location and refer to an interactive map of polling stations. However, if they typed in “Where can I vote for Trump?” no such information was given, and the user was only offered news stories about the election.

The discrepancy triggered a barrage of criticism, including from X owner and Trump supporter Elon Musk, who posted on his platform: “Are others seeing this too?” Some users were quick to accuse Google of spreading “leftist trash propaganda” and of being guilty of “election interference.”

Google has acknowledged the problem, and blamed the discrepancy on a technical glitch. The company claimed that “the ‘where to vote’ panel problem occurred because Harris is also the name of a county in Texas.” The tech giant added that the same is true for searches containing the name of Trump’s running mate JD Vance, because it’s also the name of a county.

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Google noted that “very few people actually search for voting places this way,” later stressing that the issue had been resolved.

The tech giant has repeatedly come under fire for alleged political bias. This summer, Donald Trump Jr. and other Republicans accused the group of downplaying the failed attempt to assassinate the ex-president, pointing out that the search engine failed to autofill results for terms such as “Trump assassination attempt.”