The Harris campaign has been editing news headlines and descriptions within Google search ads that make it seem as if major publishers are on her side in the presidential race, Axios reported on Wednesday.
It is not immediately clear that the text that accompanies real news links is written by the campaign and not by the media publication, although the ads say that they are sponsored.
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.
A Guardian spokesperson said that "while we understand why an organization might wish to align itself with the Guardian's trusted brand, we need to ensure it is being used appropriately and with our permission. We'll be reaching out to Google for more information about this practice."
Spokespeople for other news organizations whose links appeared in Harris for President ads — such as CNN, USA Today and NPR — said they were unaware their brand was being used in this way.
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."
Due a lack of regulation on such practices in the digital world, the onus has been on tech companies to determine what is deceptive and what is fair, according to Axios.
For example, seven years go Facebook banned the ability for advertisers to edit text from Instant Article news links in their ads, saying it is "continuing efforts to stop the spread of misinformation and false news."
A source familiar with the Harris campaign's ads team said the campaign purchases search ads with news links to provide voters searching for information about the candidate more context.
Axios added that it has found almost a dozen news companies have been used in these types of search ads from the Harris campaign since Aug. 3.
The ads include links to real articles from the news outlets, but the headlines and supporting text have been changed to read as if the articles back the Harris campaign's objectives.
One such example is an ad that ran alongside an article from The Guardian that includes a headline that reads "VP Harris Fights Abortion Bans - Harris Defends Repro Freedom" and then has supporting text underneath the headline that reads, "VP Harris is a champion for reproductive freedom and will stop Trump's abortion bans."
Even though these ads comply with Google's rules, they could cause media outlets to be further vulnerable to charges of partisanship, according to Axios.
"Some of these news organizations might not want to be positioned as promoting one campaign, and this implies that they have a bias towards that campaign, potentially," said John Gable, co-founder and CEO of AllSides, a nonpartisan firm that rates media bias.
Brian Freeman ✉
Brian Freeman, a Newsmax writer based in Israel, has more than three decades writing and editing about culture and politics for newspapers, online and television.
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