A quick update on a story I’ve been tracking for The ReidOut Blog: A federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit filed by the Republican National Committee that accused Google of discrimination against conservatives by disproportionately sending Republican fundraising emails to Gmail users’ spam folders.
In his Thursday ruling, U.S. District Judge Daniel Calabretta said the RNC had failed to show that Google was acting in bad faith by treating some of the RNC’s emails as spam. And the judge also said Google’s actions were fundamentally protected by Section 230, a legal provision of the Communications Decency Act that largely shields internet companies from liability for what is posted on their sites.
The ruling represents another blow to Republicans in their ongoing quest to prove Big Tech is biased against them. (Read more on that mission here, here and here.)
The ruling represents another blow to Republicans in their ongoing quest to prove Big Tech is biased against them.
In its lawsuit, the RNC argued that a study out of North Carolina State University provided evidence of anti-conservative bias at Google. But the study’s authors say Republicans have misrepresented their research and that the study reached no such conclusion.
Furthermore, Mashable wrote this handy post last year explaining that the RNC’s fundraising emails had likely been sent to people’s spam folders simply because they were poorly crafted — not because of nefarious machinations by Google.
Calabretta’s ruling took the RNC to task for citing the NCSU study as proof. The judge wrote:
In short, the only fact alleged by the RNC to support its conclusory allegation that “Google’s interception and diversion of the RNC’s emails, and the harm it is causing to the RNC, is intentional, deliberate, and in bad faith,” is the North Carolina State University study that expressly states there is no reason to believe Google was acting in bad faith, and the remainder of the allegations in the Complaint are inconsistent with such a conclusion.
The judge also said the fact that Google gave the RNC effective tips to improve its email campaigns showed that the tech company wasn’t operating in bad faith:
The RNC alleges that ‘for nearly a year’ Google engaged with the RNC over its concerns. Google suggested that the RNC ‘reduce the frequency of emails that it sends at the end of each month,’ informed the RNC that ‘the monthly crashing of the RNC’s inboxing rate was due to a high number of complaints,’ met with the RNC on March 29, 2022 and offered the RNC a training on August 11, 2022. In the Complaint, the RNC recounts that adopting Google’s suggestions had a ‘significantly positive impact on [email] performance,’ though they did not resolve the end-of-month issue. While the RNC may disagree with Google regarding what caused the drop in inboxing, the fact that Google engaged with the RNC for nearly a year and made suggestions that improved email performance is inconsistent with a lack of good faith.
But Republicans apparently aren’t taking no for an answer.
“This case is not over,” RNC Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel said in a statement. “The judge has given us leave to amend and re-file our complaint. This suit represents a crucial action against Big Tech’s anti-conservative bias. We look forward to filing our amended complaint and continuing this fight.”
And I look forward to calling out this “fight” for what it is: a farcical attempt by Republicans to frame themselves as victims of oppression.