- The US President of the FTC wrote directly to the CEO of Alphabet Sundar Pichai
- Andrew Ferguson accuses Gmail of having spam filters “partisans”
- Google said that filters “also apply … whatever political ideology”
The president of the FTC, Andrew Ferguson, accused Google of “supporter” of spam gmail filtering which discriminates certain political parties.
In a letter to the CEO of Alphabet, Sundar Pichai, dated August 28, 2025, Ferguson said that the republican fundraising emails were reported as spam, while democrats continue to be successfully delivered.
Ferguson warned that this could violate the prohibition of the FTC Act of unjust or deceptive business practices, suggesting that a survey and a possible application could be on the cards.
Gmail targeted once again on filtering spam of political email
“My understanding of recent reports is that Gmail spam filters regularly prevent messages from reaching consumers when these messages come from republican sender but do not block similar messages sent by Democrats,” said Ferguson.
The complaint quotes a New York Post Article, which revealed that identical emails with links by Don Winred (Republican) and Actblue (Democrats) were treated differently by Gmail.
Google has already responded to these allegations before, the company spokesman, José Castañeda, said: “E-mail filters protections are in place to ensure the safety of our users.”
Filters “also apply to all sender, regardless of political ideology”.
“The right of a consumer to hear candidates or parties, including requests for donations, is not reduced because the political preferences of this consumer can be contrary to the political preferences of your company or your employees,” wrote Ferguson.
This is not the first time that Google has been accused of political bias in its spam gmail filtering. In 2022, a legal action by the RNC said that the company had unfairly filtered the Republican emails, but the American district court rejected the case on the basis of a lack of evidence. RNC has since revived the case.
Techradar Pro Asked Google an update commented in response to the letter from the FTC August 2025 – Any answer will be published here.
