Google might have been officially ruled to have a monopoly, but we’re still a long way from figuring out exactly what that determination will change at the tech company. Today, the US Department of Justice filed notice of a plan to cross-appeal the decision last fall that Google would not be required to sell off the its Chrome browser. The agency’s Antitrust Division posted about the action on X. According to Bloomberg, a group of states is also joining the appeal filing.
At the time of the 2025 ruling, the Justice Department had pushed for a Chrome sale to be part of the outcome. Judge Amit Mehta denied the request from the agency. “Plaintiffs overreached in seeking forced divesture of these key assets, which Google did not use to effect any illegal restraints,” Mehta’s decision stated. However, he did set other restrictions on Google’s business activities, such as an end to exclusive deals for distributing some services and a requirement to share select search data with competitors.
Google has already filed its own appeal over this part of its ongoing antitrust battle. Of course, the tech giant is hoping to get off the hook with fewer penalties rather than the heavier ones the DOJ is seeking.
Google parent Alphabet (GOOG, GOOGL) became the fourth company to hit a market cap of $3 trillion Monday. The stock move comes after the company avoided the worst of the potential consequences in its antitrust trial, with federal district court Judge Amit Mehta ruling earlier this month that Google won’t have to sell its Chrome browser.
Google joins the likes of Apple (AAPL), Microsoft (MSFT), and Nvidia (NVDA) in the $3 trillion space, though Nvidia has since climbed to $4 trillion on the strength of its AI chips.
Google is one of the key players in the AI race thanks to its Gemini models and chatbot. The company, like Microsoft and Amazon, also bakes its AI into its cloud business, making for a powerful option for customers entering the space or upgrading their existing enterprise cloud subscriptions.
Citi analyst Ronald Josey wrote in an investor note Monday that Google’s antitrust trial results and cloud offerings will only help it continue to grow.
“We believe the pace of Google’s product velocity is ramping aided in part by Judge Mehta’s ruling as it provides more clear operational guidelines for Google,” Josey wrote.
“More specifically, we believe Gemini’s tools, capabilities, integration (across Google’s products), and adoption continues to expand across Google’s product halo and Google’s size and scale give it an inherent advantage (15 products with 500 [million monthly active users]).”
Google however also faces increasing competition in the search space from AI upstarts including OpenAI, Anthropic, and Perplexity.
During Google’s trial, Apple SVP of Services Eddy Cue testified that Apple had seen searches in its Safari browser decline for the first time in April. Google, however, later pushed back on the statement saying that the company is seeing growth in other areas.
Google isn’t out of the regulatory woods yet, either. The company still has to contend with its ongoing online advertising antitrust lawsuit. And according to Bloomberg, the Federal Trade Commission is probing Google and Amazon’s ad business practices.
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Email Daniel Howley at dhowley@yahoofinance.com. Follow him on X/Twitter at @DanielHowley.
Google will not have to divest its Chrome browser but will have to change some of its business practices, a federal judge has ruled. The ruling comes more than a year after the same judge ruled that Google had acted illegally to maintain a monopoly in internet search.
Following the ruling last year, the Department of Justice had proposed that Google should be forced to sell Chrome. But in a 230-page decision, Judge Amit Mehta said the government had “overreached” in its request. “Google will not be required to divest Chrome; nor will the court include a contingent divestiture of the Android operating system in the final judgment,” Mehta wrote. “Plaintiffs overreached in seeking forced divesture of these key assets, which Google did not use to effect any illegal restraints.”
Google will, however, no longer be permitted to strike exclusive deals around the distribution of search, Google Assistant, Gemini or Chrome, Mehta ruled. For example, Google can’t require device makers to pre-load its apps in order to get access to the Play Store. It also can’t condition revenue-sharing arrangements on the placement of its apps. But Google will be able to continue to pay partners — like Apple — for pre-loading search and other apps into their products. Mehta said that ending these arrangements could cause “downstream harms to distribution partners, related markets, and consumers.”
Mehta also ruled that Google will need to share some of its search data with competitors going forward. “Making data available to competitors would narrow the scale gap created by Google’s exclusive distribution agreements and, in turn, the quality gap that followed,” he wrote. The company is not required to hand over data related to its ads.
Mehta’s ruling is largely a win for the search giant, which had argued that divesting Chrome or Android “would harm Americans and America’s global technology leadership.” In a statement Tuesday, Google said it had “concerns” about some aspects of the ruling.
“Today’s decision recognizes how much the industry has changed through the advent of AI, which is giving people so many more ways to find information,” the company said. “Now the Court has imposed limits on how we distribute Google services, and will require us to share Search data with rivals. We have concerns about how these requirements will impact our users and their privacy, and we’re reviewing the decision closely.”
The company previously indicated it plans to appeal Mehta’s original decision, but said in June it would wait for a final decision in the case.
Update, September 2, 2025, 4:28PM PT: This post has been updated to add a statement from Google on the ruling.
Former senior Trump advisor Peter Navarro was sentenced to four months in prison for defying a subpoena from the House select committee investigating the January 6th protest at the Capitol.
A federal grand jury indicted Navarro this past summer on two criminal contempt of Congress charges, one for failing to appear at a deposition, and another for refusing to produce documents despite a subpoena by the Committee.
He was convicted in September 2023 on both counts.
Prosecutors in the case were seeking a six-month prison sentence claiming that Navarro showed “utter disregard” for the House committee’s probe and “utter contempt for the rule of law.”
Steve Bannon, another former White House advisor under President Donald Trump, was also convicted on two counts of contempt of Congress last year.
On top of his prison sentence, Navarro was ordered to pay a $9,500 fine.
Navarro’s defense centered on his belief that he was protected by executive privilege, which he claimed was invoked by former President Trump. However, Judge Amit Mehta ruled that there was no evidence of Trump formally invoking executive privilege to shield Navarro from the committee.
And prosecutors fed the judge what some would characterize as a gross inflation of the committee’s worth.
“The committee was investigating an attack on the very foundation of our democracy,” Assistant U.S. Attorney John Crabb said. “There could be no more serious investigation undertaken by Congress.”
There was very little of serious value that came from the January 6th committee which has now been found to have destroyed files after disbanding when Republicans took control of the House.
U.S. District Judge Mehta, who was nominated to the United States District Court for the District of Columbia by former President Barack Obama, claimed that the Justice Department’s pursuit of Navarro was not motivated by politics.
“It’s unfortunate that the statements mislead. They mislead,” Mehta said. “Nancy Pelosi is not responsible for this prosecution; Joe Biden isn’t responsible for the prosecution. It’s those kinds of statements from someone who knows better … that contributes to why our politics are so divisive.”
MEHTA took umbrage at Navarro saying in senencing memo that he was the victim of a poltiical prosecution. If that was the case, he said, wouldn’t DOJ would have prosecuted Meadows and Scavino for it too? But they didn’t.
There were some who took exception to Mehta’s contention that the pursuit of Peter Navarro and Steve Bannon over defiance of a politically biased committee of questionable authority was not a political prosecution.
Especially as the public watches President Biden’s own son openly flaunting his defiance of congressional subpoenas.
Former White House Advisor Sebastian Gorka slammed the sentencing as evidence of a deep state pursuit of the previous administration.
“Peter Navarro has been sentenced to 4 months in prison for refusing to testify before Pelosi’s illegal J6 committee,” he wrote. “Hunter Biden is walking around a free man.”
“The police state has arrived,” he added.
BREAKING
Peter Navarro has been sentenced to 4 months in prison for refusing to testify before Pelosi’s illegal J6 committee.
Trending Politics co-owner Collin Rugg also took aim at Mehta’s specious claims that the Justice Department wasn’t heavily engrossed in political persecution.
“Selective ‘justice’ strikes again,” he wrote on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter.
BREAKING: Former trade adviser to Donald Trump, Peter Navarro, has been sentenced to four months in prison for defying a sham J6 Committee subpoena.
Selective ‘justice’ strikes again.
In September, Navarro was convicted on two counts after he refused to testify and provide… pic.twitter.com/VNE4R8RPkR
Navarro indicated that he would continue the appeals process.
“It is a case that really asks the important question of whether a senior White House aide and alter ego for the president can be compelled to testify by Congress,” he said amidst protesters.
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Rusty Weiss has been covering politics for over 15 years. His writings have appeared in the Daily Caller, Fox… More about Rusty Weiss
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