Marshall says Google censors Trump assassination attempt info. That’s not how it works | Opinion

With apologies to George Orwell, oppression doesn’t always look like a boot stamping on a human face forever.

Sometimes it looks like … typing.

That’s what Sen. Roger Marshall seems to think, anyway. The Kansas Republican is accusing Google of suppressing information about last month’s assassination attempt on Donald Trump. Why? Because in the first days after the attack users had to type out a full query — something like “assassination attempt on Donald Trump” — instead of getting an assist from the search engine’s autocomplete feature.

The tech giant is engaged in “censorship against conservative voices,” the senator said last week.

Confused? Don’t worry. Conspiracy theories are often a bit of a muddle. I’ll explain more in a bit.

The important thing to know is that Marshall is leading a crusade against Google — firing off an investigatory letter to the company’s CEO and going on TV to accuse the company of “election interference” to undermine Trump’s presidential campaign.

“They don’t want to see President Trump viewed as a hero, which he was on that day, when he literally took a bullet, he stands up and he yells, ‘Fight, fight, fight,’” Marshall told Fox’s Stuart Varney last week.

This is nonsense, for several reasons.

First: It’s hard to take Marshall seriously when he cries out about “election interference.” Remember, he started his Senate career with a vote — in the hours after the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol — against certifying Joe Biden’s rightful victory in the 2020 presidential election.

That was election interference.

Second: Is there anybody in America who remains ignorant of the attack on Trump? Google couldn’t suppress the news even if it tried.

Third: Marshall’s allegation relies on the notion that Americans looking for news about the attack can’t and won’t be bothered to write out their whole query into Google’s search form.

But the information is there, incredibly easy to find.

‘Propaganda wing of the Biden-Harris administration’

You’re probably familiar with Google’s autocomplete feature, but a quick refresher for the uninitiated: The search engine tries to predict — based on the behavior of its hundreds of millions of other users — what you’re looking for, to help speed up an already-almost instantaneous search process.

Type in the words “how do I,” for example, and Google will start guessing before you’ve finished the rest of the sentence: How do I take a screenshot? How do I renew a passport?

Sometimes the predictions are what you need. Sometimes not. If that’s the case, you simply keep typing out your whole query and press “enter.” Google will immediately give you what you’re looking for. It takes all of one or two seconds more to complete the task.

After last month’s attack on Trump, MAGA conservatives started posting screenshots of “assassination attempt” inquiries on Google’s search engine. Autocomplete didn’t then suggest anything about Trump — instead predicting that users were looking for information about old attacks on Harry Truman and the pope.

Outrage ensued. One prominent conservative writer said autocomplete’s failure was “Stalinist.”

Again: Those same users could have typed out a full phrase — “assassination attempt on Donald Trump” — instead of just typing “assassination attempt” and expecting Google to read their minds. They would have easily found all the information they were seeking.

Too much to ask? Apparently.

“Stalinism,” a friend of mine noted wryly, ‘is having to complete the short sentence yourself and then click ‘Search.’”

For what it’s worth: Google officials told the Associated Press the search engine has built-in protections against autocomplete predictions involving political violence. You can debate the wisdom of that rule, but it’s certainly a simpler explanation than some grand conspiracy against the right. And for what it’s worth, the autocomplete function now offers Trump suggestions to “assassination” prompts at the top of its results.

Marshall isn’t buying it.

“Google, the largest Search Engine Operator in the world, has become a propaganda wing of the Biden-Harris Administration and the radical Left,” he posted on X Thursday.

Maybe. Or maybe Marshall and his Trumpist allies have fallen prey to a paranoid mindset that chooses to see every minuscule inconvenience as an attack on their beliefs, values and power.

The truth is out there, Senator. Just keep typing.

Joel Mathis is a regular Kansas City Star and Wichita Eagle Opinion correspondent. Formerly a writer and editor at Kansas newspapers, he served nine years as a syndicated columnist.