That was a hard position to navigate

This doesn't make the case that Google is a partisan operation, but it strongly supports that notion. From Google CEO Squirms as Jim Jordan Grills Him Over 2016 Latino Turnout Efforts by Tyler O'Neil. I find this sort of headline usually misleading. "X destroys Y in an interview" is usually followed by an article in which two sides are arguing and one might have made some good arguments. Headlines overclaim.

But in this instance, the headline seems pretty accurate. Congressman Jim Jordan has an apparently widely distributed (within Google) and praised memo from Google's head of multicultural marketing, sent the day after the election, and he is quoting specific claims by that executive to the effect that Google attempted to increase the Latino vote in selected states. As Jordan notes, increasing turnout is clearly a beneficial civic activity. Given historical voting patterns, it is easy to see that this turnout initiative only becomes political if particular demographics are chosen and in particular states. And that is what the memo obviously states.

On the face, this is a damning memo. Given other video and memos which have been leaked of the top leadership of Google lamenting the outcome of the election, including Google's CEO Sundar Pichai, the evidence of Google partisan bias seems reasonably compelling.

But in this testimony, as CEO, Pichai has to 1) retain his credibility and not say anything unbelievable, 2) support his executive for multicultural marketing, 3) claim that there is no evidence that there is any partisan bias at Google says, and 4) make the claim that the facially obvious plain reading does not say what it obviously says. The last thing Google wants is to be regulated as a public utility and partisan bias is a fast road to that outcome. Pichai is between a rock and a hard place between the memo celebrating partisan bias and the need to claim that there is no partisan bias.

Having given corporate testimony in court cases before, and recognizing the impossible position Pichai is in, it makes very uncomfortable viewing. Jordan is not hyperbolic. He is asking Pichai to draw a plain conclusion from his own executive's clear memo. And Pichai has to be able to deny the plain meaning. All he has to fall back on is that Google investigated itself and found that it did not do what it's executive said it did and which everyone within the company appears to have celebrated having done.

No way you can have a beating heart and not feel sorry for Pichai. And there is also no way to have a thinking brain and not conclude that Google did conduct itself in a partisan fashion. There was a lot of squirming.

Just as cameras can support a police officer's version of events, video can buttress a journalist's words. In this instance I watched the video expecting for it to prove that the journalist's article was overclaiming as so often happens. But the article's words and the video's display are consistent with one another. This was compelling evidence.