Google Refers Users To Leftist Group For Voter Registration Info

Google is directing Americans searching for information on how to register to vote to an organization bankrolled by left-wing dark money, The Federalist has learned.

American users who pulled up the search engine’s homepage on Tuesday were greeted with a company logo decorated with “Register to Vote” stickers. The design was seemingly in commemoration of National Voter Registration Day.

Underneath the Google search bar is a sentence that reads, “Register to vote ahead of the 2024 election.” The “Register to vote” portion contains a hyperlink that, when clicked on, redirects the user to a Google search page containing information on how potential voters can register in their respective states.

Google notes that the provided information comes from a nonprofit organization known as Democracy Works, which “promotes the use of technology to increase voter participation,” according to InfluenceWatch.

Upon clicking on the “Democracy Works” hyperlink, users are taken to a webpage with a guide compiled by the group that includes information on how potential voters in their specific state can register to vote, existing registration requirements, and absentee ballot deadlines, among other election-related dates and data. These guides also include a section titled, “Are elections secure?” which reads, “Election officials in your state and community are working hard to ensure the integrity of our elections. All states have implemented security measures to protect the vote.”

What Google does not disclose to potential voters, however, is that Democracy Works is a prominent player in Democrats’ heavily funded election machine.

As noted by InfluenceWatch, the self- professed “non-partisan” organization is bankrolled by “prominent left-of-center private foundations, such as the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, the Democracy Fund, and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.”

Other foundations to reportedly finance Democracy Works in recent years are the Omidyar Network Fund and Open Society Foundations. The former was launched by eBay founder Pierre Omidyar, while the latter was founded by George Soros. Both men are major donors to Democrat-aligned causes and organizations.

Chief among Democracy Works’ projects is TurboVote, “a software program that assists various communities, particularly colleges and corporations, with voter registration,” according to InfluenceWatch. In addition to contracting with major U.S. colleges and universities, the initiative partners with notable Big Tech firms such as Google, Microsoft, and Facebook.

As my colleague Brianna Lyman previously reported, Democracy Works’ privacy policy “states that individuals who use one of their services … may have their information shared by Democracy Works with third-party service providers, ‘partners,’ and law enforcement, amongst others.”

When pressed by The Federalist on why Google is directing potential voters to a group (Democracy Works) that is funded by Democrat-aligned entities, a Google representative claimed there “is nothing partisan” about the search feature and that Democracy Works is a “non-partisan organization that many entities work with to aggregate this official voter registration information.”

“The information comes directly from state election offices and links out to publicly available resources on state election sites, the official said. “This feature is available to everyone in the United States.”

For more election news and updates, visit electionbriefing.com.

Shawn Fleetwood is a staff writer for The Federalist and a graduate of the University of Mary Washington. He previously served as a state content writer for Convention of States Action and his work has been featured in numerous outlets, including RealClearPolitics, RealClearHealth, and Conservative Review. Follow him on Twitter @ShawnFleetwood