“If monopoly is bad for America and antitrust is something they take seriously, they ought to take freedom of expression much more seriously than the possibility of a monopoly power.”

Google’s anti-competition practices are a cause for concern for the Senate’s Antitrust Subcommittee and the National Religious Broadcasters, which claims the search engine is violating free speech.

Sens. Herb Kohl (D-Wis.) and Mike Lee (R-Utah), both members of the Subcommittee on Antitrust Competition Policy and Consumer Rights, urged the Federal Trade Commission in a Monday letter to investigate Google Inc.’s practices regarding competition.

The letter expressed concern that the search engine has switched from simply identifying Web pages that are most relevant to users’ queries without bias to producing results that blatantly favors its own products.

The letter also noted that Google may be slapping search penalties on websites that compete with its products, drastically lowering where links to these websites are found on its results list.

Although Lee and Kohl do not make any assertions as to the legality of the company’s business practices, they noted that Google dominates the market by a large percentage (65 to 70 percent of all computer based Internet searches and 95 percent of mobile Internet searches).

Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt also admitted in the Antitrust Subcommittee’s September hearing that the company was in the “area” of monopoly status. The concession was taken back in written statements.

“Given Google’s dominant market share in Internet search, any such bias or preferencing would raise serious questions as to whether Google is seeking to leverage its search dominance into adjacent markets, in a manner potentially contrary to antitrust law,” the letter stated.

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