In a complaint filed on Friday, the Republican National Committee (RNC) accused Google (NASDAQ:GOOGL) of sending its emails to users’ spam folders.
In a complaint submitted to the Eastern District of California, the U.S. political organisation claims that the internet giant discriminated against it by “throttling its email messages because of the RNC’s political affiliation and viewpoints.”
“Google has moved millions of RNC emails en masse to the spam bins of potential donors and supporters,” the RNC said in the lawsuit. This happened at a time when fundraising and building a community were very important.
An inquiry for comment from Reuters received no immediate response from Google.
Spam filters on email services often get rid of unwanted messages and move them to a different folder.
The RNC claimed that while nearly all of its emails go into users’ inboxes for the majority of the month, at the end of the month, which is a crucial time for fundraising, virtually all of its emails go into spam bins.
The lawsuit claimed that it doesn’t matter whether the email is about giving, voting, or community outreach because this time of the month is historically when the RNC’s fundraising is most effective.
Even though the committee tried to work with Google, it said that “discrimination” had been going on for almost ten months.
It said that because so much of its mail was ending up in spam folders, it had already lost money and would continue to lose money as the midterm elections approached.
Republicans have been saying for a long time that tech giants limit free speech and favour conservative ideas.
The IT firms dispute that.