U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema declined to order a Justice Department official to stay out of the government's advertising antitrust lawsuit against Google but said the department should think about it.
Google asked the Justice Department to consider requiring Jonathan Kanter, assistant attorney general in charge of antitrust, to recuse himself because of his work for a long list of Google critics.
The government has argued that Google should be forced to sell its ad manager suite. Google has denied any wrongdoing. The Justice Department filed the advertising lawsuit in January in Arlington, Virginia, along with eight states, and nine other states joined in April.