By David McCabe
Publication Date: 2026-05-22 16:34:00
Google asked a federal appeals court on Friday to reverse a landmark ruling that branded the company a monopolist in online search.
The Department of Justice sued Google in 2020, arguing that the tech giant had abused its monopoly to maintain its dominance over online search. In 2024, a district court judge agreed with the government, ruling that Google had broken the law when it paid companies including Apple and Mozilla to have its search engine appear as the first option on smartphones and in web browsers.
In a filing with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, Google said the district court judge, Amit P. Mehta, had improperly applied antitrust law in finding those deals were over the line. Judge Mehta had also overstepped when he issued a ruling to fix the monopoly concerns by forcing Google to share some data with its competitors, the company argued.
The appeal is the next turn in a yearslong battle between Google and the Department of Justice, which has…
