Conservative strategy firm Targeted Victory claims it has caught Google flagging Republican fundraising emails as “dangerous” spam while leaving similar Democratic solicitations unaffected.
The New York Post reports that a recent memo from consulting firm Targeted Victory has revealed that Google’s Gmail service has been flagging Republican fundraising emails as spam, often sending them directly to users’ spam folders. The memo, obtained exclusively by the Post, suggests that this issue has been ongoing throughout the summer months of June and July.
Targeted Victory, whose clients include prominent Republican figures such as Rep. Steve Scalise (R-LA) and Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), as well as the National Republican Senatorial Committee, conducted tests to investigate the issue. The tests involved sending identical emails through Gmail, with the only difference being the inclusion of either a WinRed donation link (a Republican fundraising platform) or an ActBlue link (a Democratic fundraising platform). The results showed that emails containing WinRed links were consistently flagged as suspicious or dangerous, while those with ActBlue links were delivered without issue.
Targeted Victory posted a YouTube video demonstrating Google’s bias in action.
This revelation has reignited allegations of political bias against Google, which has faced similar accusations in the past. In 2022, a study by researchers at North Carolina State University found that Gmail flagged 59% more Republican fundraising emails as spam compared to Democratic ones during the 2020 presidential election campaign.
