Chairman Jordan Demands Information on Biden Administration's Influence on Google's 'Woke' Gemini AI

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Today, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH) sent a letterto Alphabet, Google's and YouTube's parent company, demanding documents and communications related to the creation, training, and deployment of its Gemini AI model, an artificial intelligence chatbot technology. The Committee is investigating how and to what extent the Executive Branch has coerced or colluded with Big Tech and other intermediaries to censor Americans' speech, and this request falls within the scope of the Committee's subpoenaissued on February 15, 2023.

Recent reporting asserts that the Executive Branch, most notably the Biden White House, may have influenced the development of Alphabet's Gemini AI model. On October 30, 2023, President Biden issued an Executive Order on the "Safe, Secure, and Trustworthy Development and Use of Artificial Intelligence," which claimed to serve as an overarching guide to how the Biden Administration will approach issues like AI development and deployment. The Executive Order states that its guidelines will purportedly "advance[] equity." A report by the Alphabet's Gemini Team stated that its new AI tool was evaluated by external groups, which were selected based on their alignment with the Biden White House Executive Order and "White House Commitments."

Alphabet claimed that it worked with these external groups "to help identify areas for improvement," including "societal risk," such as alleged "representational harms." However, recent reporting has revealed the result of these so-called "improvements" to the Gemini models, showcasing Gemini's clear bias. These examples reinforce the Committee's serious concerns about the Executive Branch engaging in censorship by proxy-using surrogates to censor, suppress, or discourage speech in a manner that the government is unable to do itself. Given that Alphabet has censored First Amendment-protected speech as a result of government agencies' requests and demands in the past, the Committee is concerned about potential First Amendment violations that have occurred with respect to Alphabet's Gemini model.

The letter also requests Jack Krawczyk, Google's Senior Director of Product for Gemini, and Jen Gennai, Director of Google's Responsible Innovation team, appear for transcribed interviews before the Committee.

The Committee is seeking:

• All documents and communications relating to the inputs and content moderation for Gemini's AI image generation, including those relating to promoting or advancing diversity, equity, or inclusion;

• All documents and communications relating to the inputs and content moderation for Gemini's AI text generation, including those relating to promoting or advancing diversity, equity, or inclusion;

• All documents and communications between or among Alphabet and the Executive Branch of the United States Government referring or relating to the creation, development, training, or deployment of artificial intelligence and large language models, or the inputs and content moderation for Gemini's AI relating to the promotion or demotion of certain content as defined in the subpoena; and

• All documents and communications referring or relating to Alphabet's communications with any person(s) outside the Executive Branch of the United States Government regarding the making of decisions or policies referring or relating to the creation, development, training, or deployment of artificial intelligence and large language models, or the inputs and content moderation for Gemini's AI relating to the promotion or demotion of certain content as defined in the subpoena.

Read the full letter to Alphabet here.