Sen. Josh Hawley criticizes Google over deletion of comments critical toward China
on Wednesday, Hawley, a Republican from Missouri, called the deletions "censorship at the behest of the Chinese Communist Party," though Google has said the actions are accidental and that it is working to fix the problem.
Comments using the phrases "communist bandit" or "50-cent party" in Chinese characters are removed almost instantly from YouTube, though their English equivalents are not. In a statement to Business Insider about Hawley's letter, a YouTube spokesperson said, "We're always working to resolve issues on YouTube. Upon review by our teams, we have confirmed this was an error in our enforcement systems and have rolled out a fix." In the letter, Hawley asked Google to tell him when the company first became aware of the deletions and to explain any discussions about the specific terms. He also asked Pichai to "explain whether Google or its partners had any conversations with members, representatives, or proxies of the Chinese Communist Party about these terms." "Why is Google/YouTube censoring Americans on behalf of the CCP? This is WRONG & Big Tech is drunk with power," heThe YouTube spokesperson said the deletions were not the result of a policy change, but rather an error in automated content moderation that failed to take proper context into account. But, Hawley noted in the letter Google's history of censoring content to appease China; Google was widely criticized in 2018, including by its own employees, for ato censor the terms "human rights" and "student protest," as well as send data to Beijing. While Dragonfly was set to launch in China, the comments at the center of Hawley's concern were deleted on YouTube, which is blocked in China. Hawley is a staunch critic of both Beijing and big tech, and often scrutinizes actions by American tech companies like Google and Facebook, as well as Chinese companies like ByteDance, the owner of Tik Tok.
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