(Elias Irizarry, Headline USA) In the latest Big Tech election scheme, Google and Meta were accused of censoring information about the July 13 assassination attempt of former President Donald Trump—and possibly even implementing a total search ban on Trump’s name.
Wow, Google has a search ban on President Donald Trump!
Election interference? pic.twitter.com/dJzgVAAFZA
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 29, 2024
Users on X sounded the alarm over the weekend after they noticed that search results on Google for the assassination attempt failed to automatically appear when typed in, instead suggesting a search for an assassination attempt on former President Harry Truman.
Several Republican lawmakers—including Sens. Roger Marshall of Kansas and Mike Lee of Utah—called for investigations into the matter.
“Has there been a dramatic increase in Truman biographers in the last two weeks?” asked Marshall before announcing a formal inquiry.
In a statement, Google denied taking any manual action to censor the search result, claiming, “Our systems have protections against Autocomplete predictions associated with political violence, which were working as intended before this horrific event occurring.”
There was no manual action taken. Our systems have protections against Autocomplete predictions associated with political violence, which were working as intended prior to this horrific event. We’re working on improvements to ensure our systems are more up to date. Of course,…
— Google Communications (@Google_Comms) July 28, 2024
However, Google was not the only company to be accused of censoring Trump’s assassination attempt.
Meta’s artificial intelligence software and the Microsoft-linked ChatGPT both refused to admit that the assassination attempt ever happened, labeling it as fictional.
Big Tech Scrubs Trump's Assassination Attempt from the Internet and AI Platforms are Revising History
AI platforms and search engines are seeking to BURY and CENSOR information on the Trump assassination attempt on July 13.
• Meta AI says Trump's assassination attempt is a… pic.twitter.com/WdPnfmaZMX
— Kyle Becker (@kylenabecker) July 29, 2024
Moreover, an iconic photograph by Associated Press photographer Evan Vucci of Trump raising his fist amid the chaos was reportedly being labeled as “misinformation” by Meta platforms Facebook and Instagram.
BREAKING: Meta is now censoring actual photos of the Trump assassination attempt pic.twitter.com/o7yUbN7vsa
— Jack Poso 🇺🇸 (@JackPosobiec) July 29, 2024
Facebook and Instagram are now censoring Trump raising his fist after being shot
There’s only 1 reason they’d do this:
It’s the most powerful image of Trump in American history
And it will define his 2024 campaign victory https://t.co/KiQk7GH7QM
— DC_Draino (@DC_Draino) July 29, 2024
The AP claimed that the photo being censored was not the original photo but a modified version that showed the Secret Service agents smiling.
A photo posted to Facebook by Headline USA on Monday evening did not appear to be censored, nor did the original photos on Vucci’s Instagram account.
View this post on Instagram
Nonetheless, the reports of the censorship attempts follow a recent Axios story revealing that media editors had openly discussed efforts to suppress the photos because of the benefit they would likely have serving as “photogranda” for Trump’s campaign.
The stunning censorship campaign by Big Tech emerged only a week after Democrats staged a coup to replace President Joe Biden with Vice President Kamala Harris on their 2024 presidential ticket, while otherwise facing certain electoral defeat.
It hearkened back for many conservatives to the companies’ election-meddling in 2020 to suppress legitimate information on stories such as the Hunter Biden laptop.
Yet, the woke tech companies are likely to be emboldened following last month’s Supreme Court decision in Murthy vs. Missouri, which upheld their right to censor viewpoints at their discretion—or in partnership with government entities who may coerce them to limit unapproved speech.
Follow Elias Irizarry at twitter.com/eliasforsc.
Headline USA’s Ben Sellers contributed to this report.
