The Public Needs Transparency in US v. Google Trial

The American Economic Liberties Project, along with partners Demand Progress, Open Markets Institute, and Revolving Door Project, filed a motion yesterday with the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia in the case of U.S. v. Google, LLC, urging the Court to permit a publicly available audio feed of the unsealed portions of the upcoming antitrust trial on Google search.

“The Google search trial will be hugely consequential for our digital world where the outcome will determine how millions of Americans access and use the internet.” said Katherine Van Dyck, Senior Counsel at the American Economic Liberties Project. “Our motion to intervene is not about the convenience of a live audio feed; it is about preserving the public’s constitutional right to transparency in our judicial system. While ordinary Americans can get their whole lives exposed in court, a trillion dollar company is opposed to an accessible public trial and attempting to shroud their own proceedings in secrecy. The American public has a significant stake in the outcome of this trial, and as such, we hope the court accepts our intervention to provide much needed transparency.”

“Google’s influence on our economy and our daily digital activities is enormous. That pervasive monopoly power is now on trial, with the outcome expected to shape how millions of Americans use the internet,” said Maria Langholz, Communications Director for Demand Progress. “At the very least, the public has a right to know what goes on in this trial. We urge the court to recognize these stakes and grant live audio access to the trial proceedings.”

“Google routinely uses its monopoly power over Search and other platforms to manipulate and exploit almost every American,” said Barry Lynn, Open Markets Institute Executive Director. “The corporation poses many direct threats to our democracy and our most fundamental liberties. It is the public’s right – and a public imperative — to have live audio access to a trial that will help determine the future of Google’s role in our society.”

“This is a monumental case against a corporation that stands accused of exploiting Americans using monopoly power,” said Andrea Beaty, Research Director of the Revolving Door Project. “Those Americans deserve to be able to follow the proceedings as they happen. Opening the proceedings is clearly in the public interest, while only Google benefits from closed doors.”

The concentration of corporate power broadly affects the general public, leading to increased prices, lower quality products and services, underinvestment and stymied innovation, and harm to workers. As the motion explains, access to the courtroom should not be restricted to special interest groups in Washington, D.C. The American public has a right of access to proceedings like the trial that will play out before the Court in D.C., deciding the legality of Google’s undisputed monopoly over a number of internet search-related markets that they access every day.

Read the full motion here.

Learn more about Economic Liberties here.