It looks like – and links to – real news articles. But they’re actually ads from the Harris campaign

If you don’t look too closely, some recent ads from Kamala Harris can give the false impression that some major news organizations are taking sides in the presidential campaign.

The ads, which appeared in some Google search feeds, include links to legitimate news stories but feature — in words that appear to be headlines from the original news organizations — pro-Harris messages written by the Democratic campaign. They were revealed in an Axios article this week.

Google and the campaign defend the practice as legitimate and legal, used in the past by both Democrats and Republicans. But it has raised concerns from some of the outlets and others.

Jane Kirtley, a professor of media ethics at the University of Minnesota, said: “What this is about is confusion and deception.”

While television remains the dominant form of political advertising, Google’s under-the-radar ads also indicate that there will be many different ways political campaigns will try to reach voters this fall.

Google ads appear for consumers performing searches, usually in targeted geographic regions. One ad, for example, is headlined “Vice President Harris’ Economic Vision – Lower Costs and Higher Wages.” The copy below reads: “a future where every person has a chance not just to get by, but to get ahead. We will not go back to the failed trickle-down policies that hurt working families.”

The ad includes a link to a story on The Associated Press website, where those messages do not appear. Similarly, an ad linking to a Guardian story says Harris “is a champion of reproductive freedom and will stop Trump’s abortion bans.”

A spokesperson for The Guardian said that “while we understand why an organization might want to align itself with The Guardian’s trusted brand, we need to ensure it is used appropriately and with our permission. We will contact Google for more information about this practice.”

The AP also said it was unaware that one of its articles had been used for this purpose. “AP journalism is independent, factual and nonpartisan and should not be misrepresented in any way,” said spokesman Patrick Maks.

Other Google search ads were served using material from CBS News, CNN, Time, PBS and USA Today, according to the Google Ads Transparency Center.

There is no indication that any of the linked articles have been modified in any way. But Kirtley said he asked how many people who see the ad would click on those links, and instead mistakenly believe the ads were quoting from the articles. For news organizations, this is of crucial importance at a time when they are battling perceptions of bias by some in the public.

“Their brand is being co-opted for political advertising without prior permission or knowledge,” she said. “It’s fine if they chose to endorse someone, but you don’t want your reporting to be turned into an endorsement.”

It is not the only case where news outlets need to be aware of their work being used in a political context in an unauthorized way. The AP won’t discuss Thursday whether it needs to take steps to prevent the unauthorized use of the now-iconic photo of former President Donald Trump following an assassination attempt this summer; Apparently it will be on the cover of Trump’s upcoming book.

Google notes that Harris ads are clearly labeled as “sponsored” so they can be distinguished from regular search results and show that they are paid for by the Harris campaign. “It is quite common for advertisers to link to or quote external websites, including news websites, in their ads,” Google said in a statement.

Indeed, the campaigns of Georgia Governor Brian Kemp and Tennessee Senator Marsha Blackburn used similar Google ads during the Republican primary campaigns. But in 2017, Facebook decided to ban a similar practice in advertising after the Wall Street Journal raised questions about it.

The Harris Google ad campaign seems limited in scope. Ads linking to the Guardian and AP articles both appeared only in searches for users in the swing state of Pennsylvania, and both appeared less than 2,000 times, according to the Center for Ad Transparency. The Harris campaign said it has no plans to cut the ads.

“I don’t think it’s a big deal,” said Robert Shrum, a veteran Democratic political strategist and director of the Center for the Future of Politics at the University of Southern California.

Harris Google’s effort is an indication that campaigns will be looking for new and creative ways to reach voters in the next few months, said Steve Caplan, who is teaching a political advertising class at USC this fall. An expected trend: an explosion of ads on streaming services like Netflix, which never supported ads.

“You’re trying to find new and innovative ways to break into a media environment that’s very crowded and requires strategy and creativity,” Caplan said.

Still, television ads — especially in swing states — are expected to dominate.

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Associated Press correspondent Barbara Ortutay in San Francisco contributed to this report. David Bauder writes about the media for the AP. Follow him at http://twitter.com/dbauder.