Google fights Rumble’s bid to disqualify US judge over lawyer friendship

By Mike Scarcella

WASHINGTON, Nov 24 (Reuters) -

Alphabet’s (GOOGL.O) Google has urged a federal judge in California to reject video-sharing platform Rumble’s bid for his recusal from an antitrust lawsuit against the tech giant, arguing that the judge’s friendship with a senior Google attorney should not disqualify him from hearing the case.

In a on Friday, Google told U.S. District Judge Haywood Gilliam Jr in Oakland that courts have long held that “friendship between a judge and a lawyer, or other participant in a trial, without more, does not require recusal.”

Google said the attorney, Cassandra Knight, “is not a party to this litigation, never entered an appearance in this case, and has not otherwise had any involvement in the matter.”

Google and Rumble did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Rumble sued Google in 2021, accusing it of violating antitrust law by favoring YouTube in search results and scheming with device makers to block Rumble from being preinstalled on some Android phones.

Gilliam Rumble’s lawsuit in May, and Rumble has since appealed to the San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Rumble in a this month said Gilliam should have removed himself from the case. Rumble said it had only recently learned about Gilliam’s friendship with Knight from an alumni magazine report published by Stanford’s law school. Rumble listed a group of cases involving Google where Gilliam did step aside.

Google, in Friday’s filing, called Rumble’s request a “cynical maneuver” aimed at bolstering its pending appeal.

Knight, a Google vice president for legal matters, said in a

on Friday that she supervises 200 attorneys but has not directed or assisted in Google’s defense in Rumble’s lawsuit. She said more than 1,000 employees work in the legal department.

Knight and Gilliam were Stanford Law classmates in the 1990s, according to the July . Knight spoke at Gilliam’s 2014 investiture when he joined the court, and the judge officiated at her wedding.

Knight, who joined Google in 2022, said she has never discussed any Google litigation with Gilliam. Google argued that their connection does not on its own create “a significant risk that the judge will resolve the case on a basis other than the merits.”

The case is Rumble Inc v. Google LLC, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, No. 4:21-cv-00229-HSG.

For Rumble: Nicholas Gravante and Philip Iovieno of Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft, and Robert Dickerson Jr of Competition & Technology Law Group

For Google: John Schmidtlein and Edward Bennett of Williams & Connolly, and David Kramer of Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati

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