As Twitter has banned political ads on its website while Facebook has continued allowing similar ads, search engine giant Google is being pressured to take a side on the divisive issue, Politico reports.
Politico reports that Google, which owns the video-sharing giant YouTube, has earned over $120 million from political ads since May of 2018, which accounted for over one-tenth of Google’s overall revenue.
Up to this point, Google seems to have maintained the same approach as Facebook in allowing political ads on its site. As a result, it has taken criticism from political figures on both sides of the aisle. Democratic senators such as Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii), and Mark Warner (D-Va.) have demanded that Google take Twitter’s side and ban political ads, while Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) said that Google should maintain its current policy of allowing such ads.
Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey’s announcement that the micro-blogging platform would discontinue all political ads sparked a chain reaction of other tech companies doing the same, including Pinterest, LinkedIn, TikTok, and Twitch.