Alphabet’s Chairman on Government, China and Fake News

John L. Hennessy talks about the future that Silicon Valley is creating, the rise of employee activism and how Google should address censorship

Alphabet Chairman John Hennessy talks to The Wall Street Journal about the duty of board members and the best students to come out of Stanford University, where he directs a scholars program.

This week, President Donald Trump accused Google of bias against conservatives and suggested that government intervention might be necessary. Deflecting such criticisms is now part of the job for John L. Hennessy, who became chairman of Google parent company Alphabet Inc. six months ago

A former president of Stanford University, Mr. Hennessy’s role at Alphabet is to help guide the tech giant through a turbulent period of growth. He’s heard from users worried about data privacy, regulators wondering how to hold the search engine’s...