More Americans say social media websites are more biased than search engines, according to a new Hill.TV survey.
The poll, conducted by Hill.TV and the HarrisX polling company, found that 51 percent of respondents said they believe search engines such as Google and Bing are “largely neutral,” while 43 percent said the same about social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter.
Fourteen percent of those polled said search engines favor conservative views over others, while 17 percent said the same about social media companies.
More people polled said search engines and social media companies tended to favor liberal views over others, with 36 percent saying that for search engines, and 40 percent saying the same for social media platforms.
The survey comes as Google, Facebook, and Twitter find themselves under fire from conservatives amid complaints of bias on their platforms.
The Department of Justice announced on Wednesday that that Attorney General Jeff Sessions will meet with state attorneys general in September on whether tech companies are “intentionally stifling” the free movement of ideas on their websites, signaling that the Trump administration is moving to take action amid the allegations.
The tech companies have repeatedly denied censoring conservative speech.
Twitter’s CEO Jack Dorsey, who testified on Wednesday before the Senate Intelligence Committee on foreign election interference, was expected to face questions from lawmakers on the claims of conservative censorship.
Hill campaign reporter Reid Wilson told Hill.TV’s Joe Concha on Wednesday that tech companies are concerned that conservatives have begun to use their platforms as scapegoats.
“They’re really nervous that they are becoming the scapegoat for Republicans who want to shift the focus for what they see as the liberal media, which is now transferring into the liberal Silicon Valley,” Wilson said on “What America’s Thinking.”
The American Barometer poll was conducted on August 31-September 1, among 1,000 registered voters. The sampling margin of error is 3.1 percentage points.
— Julia Manchester
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