Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign is trying to give an impression that major news outlets are consistently publishing highly positive articles about her relatively new candidacy. Harris’ campaign team has been quietly editing news headlines in Google search results to give the impression that major news outlets are supportive of her, according to a report.
The altered headlines—each accompanied by a “Paid for by Harris for President” banner—were modified without the knowledge of the news outlets involved, Axios reported on Tuesday. Almost a dozen publishers, including major organizations such as the Guardian, Reuters, CBS News, the Associated Press, and PBS, were caught up in this misleading headline campaign.
Editing Headlines in favor of Harris
Even smaller outlets, such as North Dakota’s WDay Radio, had their headlines altered. These ads link to genuine articles from news sources, but the headlines and accompanying text were edited to present the 59-year-old presidential candidate in a favorable light.
For instance, one ad linked to a Guardian article featured the headline “VP Harris Fights Abortion Bans – Harris Defends Repro Freedom,” with supportive text underneath that read, “VP Harris is a champion for reproductive freedom and will stop Trump’s abortion bans.”
Another ad linked to an NPR article claimed, “Harris Will Lower Health Costs,” with additional text stating, “Kamala Harris will lower the cost of high-quality affordable health care,” as reported by Axios.
Representatives from affected outlets like CNN, USA Today, and NPR—all of which have published positive content about Harris recently—said that they were unaware their companies were involved in the campaign.
“While we understand why an organization might wish to align itself with the Guardian’s trusted brand, we need to ensure it is being used appropriately and with our permission. We’ll be reaching out to Google for more information about this practice,” a Guardian spokesperson said.
No Legal Issues
According to Google’s ad transparency center, Donald Trump’s campaign is not using these types of ads. Although the tactic is misleading, it does not breach Google’s policies since the altered ads are clearly marked as “sponsored” and are “easily distinguishable from search results.”
The strategy seems to be an attempt to generate even more positive headlines and extend the ‘honeymoon’ phase that Republicans say Harris is experiencing after stepping in for President Joe Biden’s campaign.
Meanwhile, despite entering the race 24 days ago, Harris has yet to participate in an interview or hold a press conference.
It’s not immediately obvious to users that the text accompanying genuine news links is authored by the campaign rather than the media outlet.
In 2017, Facebook banned advertisers from editing text from news links in their ads, saying that the decision was part of its ongoing efforts to curb the spread of misinformation and fake news.
Google, however, maintains that because the ads are clearly labeled as “sponsored,” they are “easily distinguishable from search results.”
