US Republicans sue Google

The GOP blames the tech giant for discriminating against it for political reasons

The Republican National Committee (RNC) filed a lawsuit against Google on Friday, accusing the tech giant of sending its emails straight to users’ spam folders.

Google is “discriminating” against the RNC because of its “political affiliation and views,” a lawsuit filed in a US district court in California claimed.

“Google has relegated millions of RNC emails en masse to potential donors and supporters to spam folders during pivotal points in election fundraising and community building,” the document read.

This “throttling” of emails has been underway for the last ten months, the organization claimed. It didn't happen all the time, with the messages being only sent to spam folders at the end of every month, which is “historically when the RNC’s fundraising is most successful,” it added.

The RNC estimated that the alleged actions by Google cost it $75,000 in lost donations and could also lead to potential long-term losses “in the millions of dollars.”

By filing the lawsuit, the committee is looking to get an injunction ordering Google to stop filtering its messages as spam, as well as unspecified monetary damages.

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Google has rejected the RNC’s accusations, with company spokesman Jose Castaneda hinting that Republicans were themselves to blame.

“As we have repeatedly said, we simply don’t filter emails based on political affiliation. Gmail’s spam filters reflect users’ actions,” Castaneda told Reuters.

Google provides “training and guidelines to campaigns” about how its Gmail system works, he said, adding that it recently launched a pilot for political senders to help them bypass spam filters. A source familiar with the issue told The Verge last week that the RNC “has not joined or even applied” for Google’s pilot program.

The lawsuit was filed just weeks ahead of the November 8 general election in the US, in which the Republicans are expected to outmatch the Democrats.