Google suppresses results for pro-life centers after pressure from lawmakers
After pressure from Democrat lawmakers, Google will no longer show crisis pregnancy centers in Google Maps when users search for abortion-related services in their location. Crisis pregnancy centers provide financial and medical assistance to help mothers carry their pregnancies to full term.
Senator Mark Warner (D-VA) last week boasted about pressuring Google to suppress pro-life centers and only show the locations of assisted feticide clinics such as Planned Parenthood.
“Back in June @RepSlotkin and I wrote to @Google urging them to improve their search results and prevent users that search for abortion clinics and services from being misled. Today I received a response from Google and am happy to report that they’re taking action,” Warner tweeted Thursday.
“Soon, those who search for ‘abortion clinics near me’ will only see facilities that have been verified to provide abortions in the local search box on Google, meaning that far fewer women will be mistakenly led to ‘crisis pregnancy centers’ that often provide misinformation,” he continued. “Additionally, as our letter requested, Google says results for searches such as ‘abortion clinics’ will ‘be clearly labeled as to whether the facility provides abortions'."
Warner claimed that the move is solely to help Google provide a better user experience and not to censor political dissent.
“Importantly, this isn't about silencing voices or restricting speech,” he concluded. “It's about returning search results that accurately address a user's query and giving users information that is relevant to their searches. I appreciate @Google taking these steps to improve its services.”
It is unlikely that Warner and Rep. Slotkin had to exert too much pressure on the tech conglomerate, which has been known to suppress dissenting political views on its own initiative.
In February, the tech conglomerate sent civil liberties organization America’s Frontline Doctors a message that it would be downranking AFLDS.org in Google’s search results because of the medical opinions expressed by the group of physicians.
“Your site appears to violate our medical content policy and contains content primarily aimed at providing medical advice, diagnosis or treatment for commercial purposes,” read the notification. “Nor do we allow content from any site that contradicts or runs contrary to scientific or medical consensus and evidence based best practices. Learn more."
Google made no pretenses about their expectations from AFLDS. They offer only one option for responding to the alert: To delete content from the AFLDS website and then click the “Request Review” button which is prefaced with the question, “Done fixing?”
Until AFLDS “submits” to Google’s self-censorship demands, the search giant plans to continue censoring the AFLDS site by reducing display features, lowering its ranking or even removing it from Google Search results.
Earlier this month Frontline News reported that GOP Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel Saturday accused Google of deliberately sending Republican National Committee (RNC) fundraising emails to spam.
In a series of tweets, McDaniel shared that this has been a practice of Google’s for the last eight consecutive months. The RNC’s emails throughout the month typically have a 90%-100% inbox delivery rate but drop down to 0% at the end of the month when the fundraising emails are sent out.
“These are emails that go to our most engaged, opt-in supporters without any increase in user complaints, changes to the content, email frequency or target audiences that could account for the suppression,” said McDaniel.
“Yet month after month – like clockwork – right ahead of a CRITICAL period when voters are most engaged, Google blocks our emails. They even block GOTV emails,” McDaniel added, referring to “Get Out the Vote” voter registration drives.
