Waymo employees are still Googlers effectively. They ride the same buses, eat in the same cafeterias, go to the TGIF meetings, etc.

Which articles about Waymo did you read that didn't mention its relationship with Google? I've yet to find one.

I'm not actually all that interested in self-driving cars at this point in their development (one can only be excited about a finite number of non-existent things at once), so I haven't been scouring articles, merely skimming (if even that). I've noticed the articles mention Google but figured they're mentioning it because Google also has a self-driving car they're working on.

TBH most of the articles I've read that mention Waymo are in relation to their lawsuit with Uber, and many of them say "Alphabet" and not "Google", and Alphabet still doesn't register as Google in my mind.

One might have scrolled by headlines at some point and only subconsciously registered it.

When they were first spun off I wondered the same thing until I realised it was Google.