Election 2024: Google corrects Elon Musk-boosted claim about Kamala Harris bias

X owner and Trump supporter Elon Musk reposted a message on Election Day claiming Google is helping Harris voters find polling places, while not doing the same for Trump voters, but the search giant is doing no such thing.

At about 3 p.m. EST on Tuesday, Musk reposted a conspiracy theory on X, the social media site he owns, that falsely claims Google is giving Kamala Harris an unfair advantage.

Sharing a message from X user DogeDesigner to his 203 million followers, Musk wrote, “Are others seeing this too?” According to DogeDesigner, “Google shows a ‘Where to Vote’ section with a map for Kamala Harris, but not for Donald Trump.

Google is the biggest corporate donor to the Democratic Party.”

The problem is DogeDesigner is way off — Google’s “Where to Vote” section includes voting information for counties, not candidates. Possibly unbeknownst to both DogeDesigner and Musk, there is a Harris County in both Texas and Georgia.

Underneath DogeDesigner’s post was a Community Note with more context provided: “The search query works because Harris is a county in Texas.”

Readers added that surname-sounding counties like Clark, Clinton, Eden, Franklin, Floyd, Leon, and Marcy are all searchable on Google’s “Where to Vote” feature.

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Additionally, the NewsFromGoogle X account tweeted a similar message:

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Placated by Google’s explanation, Musk reposted their message at about 4 p.m. EST, writing, “Thanks for the clarification,” though his original repost on the subject remains on his account.

Misinformation has been rife during the 2024 election. Lies, conspiracy theories, and political deepfakes have circulated on major social media platforms, making it difficult for people to know what’s real and what’s not. Just days before the election, for example, the Federal Bureau of Investigation issued a warning, urging voters to seek reliable information from trusted sources, including their local election office.

You can find your local office by using this search tool from the U.S. government. Through its #TrustedInfo2024 campaign, the National Association of Secretaries of State also provides a roundup of official links to frequently asked questions about every state and territory’s election process. Through these links, you can learn basic, accurate information about the election, such as where to vote and how votes are counted, topics that may be subject to last-minute rumors and misinformation.

To vet suspicious claims in real time, you may also consider consulting trusted fact-checking and misinformation-detecting outlets, including Fact.check.org, Politifact, The Washington Post’s Fact Checker, Snopes, and NewsGuard’s Election Misinformation Monitoring Center.