Google search results exclude Biden's presidency when asked for a list of 'US presidents in order'

 

The Biden administration was removed from Google’s list of presidents for a time on Thursday morning

Thursday 23 January 2025 08:55 EST

On Thursday morning, a glitch temporarily removed former President Joe Biden from Google search results for the term “US Presidents.” The issue was fixed around 2 a.m. Eastern time, though it’s unclear how long Biden was missing from the list. In the meantime, the list showed Donald Trump as having served two consecutive terms, followed by the previous presidents like Obama, Bush, and Clinton.

The removal of Biden from the list was first noticed by users on BlueSky, many of whom speculated that it was part of a larger effort by Big Tech to align with Trump. This speculation grew after several Silicon Valley leaders, including Apple’s Tim Cook, Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg, and Google’s Sundar Pichai, joined Elon Musk on Monday to witness Trump’s “inauguration” as the 47th president. Musk made headlines that day for his controversial rally appearance, during which he gave what some called an “odd salute.” One user on BlueSky remarked, “If this stands, it will be one of the most dangerous moments in internet history, signaling that those who oppose this narrative will be erased completely.”

Another user suggested the Biden erasure was part of a “high-level hack,” while others voiced similar concerns about the situation. “Google United States Presidents and Biden is not on there. This is bigger than social media,” one commenter wrote.

Meanwhile, in the days leading up to the glitch, Meta users reported issues with their accounts automatically following President Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance. Many were unable to unfollow them despite repeated attempts. One user, Anna Springer, said on Threads, “I kept unfollowing Trump and Vance on Monday, but they kept showing up in my follow list again. Not sure if it was a glitch or intentional, but it definitely happened.”

Meta’s communications director, Andy Stone, responded to these complaints on X, stating that users were not being forced to follow Trump or Vance’s official accounts. He explained that the White House manages these pages, and with a new administration, the content changes. He added that the issues with following and unfollowing could take time to resolve as accounts are transferred.