The White House is considering an an antitrust investigation into 'online platform bias' at Google and Facebook

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Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg.

• The proposed executive order would ask federal law enforcement to "thoroughly investigate whether any online platform has acted in violation of the antitrust laws," to "protect competition among online platforms and address online platform bias."
• President Trump has previously said, "Social Media is totally discriminating against Republican/Conservative voices."
• He has also stated, wrongly, that Google discriminated against his State of the Union speech.
• There is no evidence that either Google or Facebook discriminate against conservatives.

The White House has drafted a text of a proposed executive order for President Donald Trump that would trigger an antitrust investigation into Google and Facebook, according to Bloomberg.

The proposed text would order federal law enforcement to "thoroughly investigate whether any online platform has acted in violation of the antitrust laws," to "protect competition among online platforms and address online platform bias," and to determine whether consumers have been harmed "through the exercise of bias," Bloomberg reported.

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The president and other conservatives have repeatedly complained that they believe Facebook and Google (owned by corporate parent Alphabet) bias the way they show news to users by dampening down conservative voices or outlets. In August, Trump tweeted, "Social Media is totally discriminating against Republican/Conservative voices. Speaking loudly and clearly for the Trump Administration, we won't let that happen. They are closing down the opinions of many people on the RIGHT, while at the same time doing nothing to others......."

Trump later claimed that Google did not highlight his State of the Union speech on its front page even though it had always done that for President Obama. But that allegation turned out to be entirely false. Google promoted Trump's State of the Union event in the same way it did for Obama.

Facebook has removed some conservative commentators from its platform, such as the conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, after they broke Facebook's rules against "glorifying violence" and "hate speech" against minorities. Many conservatives believe that shows the platforms do not give them a fair shake.

But there is no evidence that either Facebook or Google systematically discriminates left or right.

The draft order is in its preliminary stages, Bloomberg said.

While the political bias aspect of the order would likely be the most controversial aspect, it would also be the least threatening to either Google or Facebook. The First Amendment to the US Constitution bans the government from restricting or imposing speech. Federal authorities cannot require any company to publish views it favors.

The more worrying aspect of the draft, from the point of view of the companies, is the antitrust aspect. That could cost the companies real money. The European Union recently fined Google $5 billion for abusing its power over phone manufacturers through its dominance of Android; and $2 billion for its distortion of shopping search results that favored Google's own properties over superior independent results.

Google has a dominance of the search market that approaches 90% or more in many markets. And between them, Google and Facebook receive 90% of all new advertising dollars spent on the web. Facebook and Google capture 71% of all digital ad spending in Europe, according to analyst Brian Weiser at Pivotal Research.

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