Former President Donald Trump accused Vice President Kamala Harris' campaign of breaking the law by spreading misinformation through Google ads.
The Harris campaign has been editing news headlines and descriptions within Google search ads that make it appear as if major news organizations are on her side, Axios reported.
"Kamala Harris team, and Google, caught manipulating headlines and stories, creating FAKE NEWS. This is not legal!!!" Trump posted shortly after midnight Tuesday on Truth Social.
Axios reported that the Harris campaign has been editing news headlines and descriptions, and it's not immediately clear that the text accompanying real news links is written by the campaign and not by the media publication, although the ads say that they are sponsored.
Companies such as The Guardian, Reuters, CBS News, the Associated Press, and PBS were among those affected by the faux headline campaign.
The Trump campaign is not running these types of ads, but this technique, which does not violate Google's policies, has been used by political campaigns before and is a common practice in commercial advertising, according to Google's ad transparency center.
Google said that because ads on Search are prominently labeled as "sponsored," they're "easily distinguishable from Search results," adding that for years "we've provided additional levels of transparency for election ads specifically.
Charlie McCarthy ✉
Charlie McCarthy, a writer/editor at Newsmax, has nearly 40 years of experience covering news, sports, and politics.
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