Google will lift its ban on political ads on Wednesday, ending a self-imposed prohibition that had been active since the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol.
Google announced the decision in an email to political clients Monday morning. Google had also banned political ads on its platforms, including YouTube and Google search pages, after the 2020 election as part of a broader effort to clamp down on political misinformation. Google will now return ads from campaigns and ads on political topics to those sites, which have seen nearly $750 million in advertising since the spring of 2018, according to Google’s ad disclosure portal.
Google told CNBC it will “continue to rigorously enforce our ads policies, which strictly prohibit demonstrably false information that could significantly undermine trust in elections or the democratic process.”
Like Google, Facebook banned political ads from its platform ahead of the election. It extended that prohibition indefinitely after former President Donald Trump showed no signs he would concede. Facebook’s ban remains in place for the time being.
