In a letter to the legal team of Alphabet, owners of Google and YouTube, House Judiciary Committee chairman Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) accused the tech giant of providing an unconvincing response to the Committee’s subpoena of various internal communications.
What’s more, it seems that Google has redacted information in defiance of Committee instructions in the subpoenas it issued in February this year.
Google CEO Sundar Pichai testifies remotely during a House Judiciary subcommittee hearing on antitrust on Capitol Hill on Wednesday, July 29, 2020, in Washington. (Mandel Ngan/Pool via AP)
“[D]espite explicit instructions enclosed with the subpoena to produce unredacted documents, Alphabet has frustrated the Committee’s review of the responsive material by unilaterally redacting key information necessary to understand the context and content of the material,” wrote Rep. Jordan.
“These redactions do not appear to be based on any applicable privilege— because Alphabet has asserted none and the Committee requires this material to be produced without redactions.”
Per the letter, Google also failed to provide an “appreciable volume” of key information to the Committee, including communications with third parties like the Global Disinformation Index (GDI), an organization that sought to blacklist conservative media and was in contact with every major tech company.
The letter also accuses Google of providing insufficient information about its communications and responses to censorship requests from the federal government.
“The release of the Twitter Files has shown just how extensively the Executive Branch communicated and coordinated with technology companies regarding content moderation,” wrote Rep, Jordan. “We are skeptical that Alphabet’s interactions with the federal government where pressure was applied were any less concerning than those of Twitter.”
“If Alphabet fails to comply in full with the subpoena’s demands, the Committee may be forced to consider the use of one or more enforcement mechanisms,” concluded Rep. Jordan.
If Alphabet fails to comply with the Committee’s subpoena, several enforcement options are available, including a vote to hold the company in contempt of Congress — although that must ultimately be approved by a full vote of the House.
Allum Bokhari is the senior technology correspondent at Breitbart News. He is the author of #DELETED: Big Tech’s Battle to Erase the Trump Movement and Steal The Election.