US states led by Texas file an amended Google lawsuit, providing more details about “Project Bernanke”, which allegedly gave Google's own ad-buying an advantage
A group of U.S. states led by Texas have filed an amended complaint against Alphabet Inc's (GOOGL.O) …
Context & Ripple Effects
The Texas-led antitrust case against Google began with the 2019 multistate investigation and the December 2020 filing alleging Google paid Facebook for special privileges in exchange for staying out of a competing ad system. Last month the states unsealed a filing claiming Google keeps up to 42% of the money paid for online ads.
The amended complaint now adds specifics on "Project Bernanke," the alleged mechanism by which Google's own ad-buying tools gained an advantage inside its exchange. The detail matters because the states are building the evidentiary record in parallel with the DOJ's ad tech monopoly suit, which Illinois, Michigan and seven other states joined in April 2023.
First-order effects
- Google now faces a more specific pleading on Project Bernanke, narrowing the dispute from broad monopoly allegations to a named internal program the states say rigged auction dynamics in Google's favor.
- The states gain a sharper narrative for the court: self-preferencing in ad buying, layered on top of the earlier Facebook-exclusion allegations already in the case.
Second-order effects
- Advertisers and publishers named as injured parties in the states' filings have a concrete hook — the alleged take-rate and auction-manipulation claims — to press in parallel private damages suits.
- Google's defense strategy must now cover a documented internal program rather than abstract market-share arguments, raising the cost of settling versus litigating as the DOJ case proceeds on overlapping ad tech conduct.
Third-order effects
- If the states' theory survives, ad tech intermediaries face structural remedies — forced divestiture or auction transparency — that would redraw who captures value between advertisers and publishers across the industry.
- The case cements a two-track enforcement model in which state AGs supply granular conduct evidence while the DOJ pursues the monopoly framework, a template likely to be applied to other platform self-preferencing disputes.
The trend: State attorneys general are escalating ad tech antitrust enforcement against Google by converting broad monopoly claims into specific, documented self-preferencing allegations that run parallel to the DOJ's case.