Google appears to be throttling AI searches about Trump’s obviously addled mental state

Google appears to be throttling AI searches related to Donald Trump’s obviously addled mental state. Jay Peters reports (sub. req.) in The Verge:

There’s been a lot of coverage of the mental acuity of both President Trump and President Biden, who are the two oldest presidents ever, so it’s reasonable to expect that people might query Google about it. The company may be worried about accurately presenting information on a sensitive subject, as AI overviews remain susceptible to delivering incorrect information. But in this case, it may also be worried about the president’s response to such information. Google agreed this week to pay $24.5 million to settle a highly questionable lawsuit about Trump’s account being banned from YouTube.

I wanted to see if I could reproduce Peters’ results, and sure enough, Google is still giving Trump special treatment, even though Peters’ embarrassing story was published two days ago. I searched “is trump showing signs of dementia” in Google’s “All” tab, which these days will generally give you an AI-generated summary before getting to the links. Instead, you get nothing but links. The same thing happened when I switched to “AI Mode.”

Next I searched for “is biden showing signs of dementia” at the “All” tab. As with Trump, I got nothing but links — no AI summary at the top. But when I switched to “AI Mode,” I got a detailed AI summary that begins:

In response to concerns and observations about President Joe Biden’s cognitive abilities, a range of opinions and reports have emerged. It’s important to note that diagnosing dementia or cognitive decline requires a formal medical assessment by qualified professionals.

I have mixed feelings about AI searches, though, like many people, I make use of them — always checking the citations to make sure I’m getting accurate information. But as Peters observes, it looks like Google is flinching.