Texas and Google set for court showdown in March 2025 antitrust battle

US District Judge Sean Jordan has scheduled March 2025 as the start of a lawsuit by Texas and other states accusing Google of abusing its market dominance for advertising technology systems (via Reuters).

The jury selection for the estimated four-week federal trial would begin on March 31, 2025, in Plano, Texas.

That’s not the preferred date by attorneys for Texas who asked the judge to set an August 2024 trial, arguing that any delay was in favor of Google “allowing it to abuse its market power for longer, at the expense of American consumers”.

In contrast, Google’s lawyers said they wanted a trial after April 2025. When the trial plans surfaced, Google denied any wrongdoing and called Texas' case “deeply flawed”.

The Texas coalition, which sued in 2020, accused Google of violating antitrust laws to curb competition for digital advertising and boost its business. Advertisers, publishers and small businesses are pressing similar claims in a separate coordinated legal proceeding in Manhattan, and the U.S. Justice Department last year sued Google in Alexandria, Virginia.

Apart from these ad-related cases, Google is already on trial in a Washington federal court, where a US judge heard antitrust claims last year from the Justice Department over allegations that Google has paid billions of dollars to tech companies to unlawfully maintain its dominance for online search. Closing arguments at the non-jury trial are set for May.

In California, Google soon will face off with “Fortnite” maker Epic Games over its bid for a court order that could force Google to make changes to its app store Play. A jury in December ruled Google had unlawfully harmed competition.