Google's 111-page D.C. Circuit brief attacks Judge Mehta's 2024 search monopoly ruling, targeting data-sharing orders and default-placement bans as legally overbroad.
Google submitted a 111-page opening brief to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit on May 23, 2026, urging the court to overturn Judge Amit Mehta's 2024 ruling that the company illegally monopolized the general search market [1]. The brief argues that Mehta committed fundamental legal errors in both his liability findings and the remedies he imposed, and asks the appellate court to vacate the judgment in full [1].
The appeal arises from United States v. Google LLC, the Justice Department's landmark Sherman Act case tried before Mehta in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. Mehta issued his liability ruling in August 2024, finding that Google had unlawfully maintained its monopoly through exclusive default-placement agreements with device manufacturers and carriers [2]. The remedies phase followed, producing orders that Google contends go well beyond what the law permits. The DOJ's counterbrief is due in July 2026, and both the DOJ and a coalition of state attorneys general have filed cross-appeals seeking a remedy that would include divestiture of the Chrome browser [2].
Google's brief concentrates its heaviest fire on the data-sharing remedy. The company argues that requiring it to license proprietary search data to competitors would expose trade secrets and confer windfalls on AI developers, including OpenAI, that were never harmed by the conduct Mehta found unlawful [1]. That framing tracks a principle established in antitrust law that remedies must be tailored to the specific violation, not leveraged to restructure an industry more broadly. Google also argues that the prohibition on default-placement agreements is overbroad and would chill procompetitive contracting that benefits consumers [1]. The invocation of the D.C. Circuit's earlier Microsoft ruling signals that Google intends to press appellate norms requiring courts to calibrate relief narrowly to proven harm [1].
The D.C. Circuit's decision will set the boundaries of permissible antitrust remedies in platform markets for years. If the court sustains the data-sharing order, rivals and AI companies could gain access to query-and-click data that Google has guarded as a core competitive asset. If the court narrows or vacates that remedy, it will signal limits on the government's ability to use antitrust litigation to reshape data ecosystems. The Chrome divestiture question, raised on cross-appeal, presents the court with an even more structural choice. Oral argument has not yet been scheduled [2].