Google on Saturday announced it’s falling in line with President Donald Trump’s executive order to rename Lake Ontario to Lake America, changing the name of the body of water for those in the U.S. using its Google Maps service.
The online search giant explained that the move is part of its “long-standing” policy to make updates when there’s name changes in official government sources, thus, those in the U.S. will see “Lake America,” a name cooked up by Trump on Thursday as a result of the ongoing trade war with Canada.
The company noted that America’s northern neighbors will continue to see Lake Ontario, a name that’s been around since the 17th century (predating Canada and the U.S.) and, per scholars, stems from the Iroquois word meaning “shining sea” or “beautiful lake.”
The rest of the world, according to Google, will see “Lake Ontario (Lake America)” when hovering over the body of water on the platform.
The change is similar to an earlier move by the tech giant after Trump, in his first day back in office, signed an executive order calling on federal agencies to rename the Gulf of Mexico to the “Gulf of America.”
The move — which also saw the company changing Denali in Alaska back to Mount McKinley on its maps service — sparked backlash at the time, with critics pointing to Google and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai’s attending Trump’s inauguration earlier that month. In the wake of the change, Google Maps reportedly deleted reviews slamming the new name.
One critic on X described the company’s latest act of renaming as “genuinely disturbing.”
“like this will obviously just be changed back day 1 after trumps regime is over but its just deeply sad, not even demoralizing, just pathetic,” wrote @CantEverDie on X.
Another user on the platform blasted the move as “weak,” adding, “no one is calling it that.”
And at least one user shared their disappointment in the company, writing, “One of the things I’m most going to take away from the Trump era is how many people and institutions and corporations don’t actually stand for anything and will capitulate to bad people at a moments notice when having principles is even slightly inconvenient to them.”
