🔗 Share this article

Can the EU ever resist Donald Trump and American tech giants? Present passivity goes beyond a legal or financial shortcoming: it represents a ethical collapse. This situation calls into question the bedrock of the EU's democratic identity. What is at stake is not only the future of companies like Google or Meta, but the fundamental idea that Europe has the authority to govern its own online environment according to its own regulations.

Background Context

First, it's important to review the events leading here. During the summer, the European Commission accepted a humiliating agreement with Trump that locked in a permanent 15% tariff on EU exports to the US. The EU received nothing in return. The embarrassment was compounded because the commission also consented to provide well over $1tn to the US through financial commitments and purchases of energy and military materiel. The deal exposed the vulnerability of the EU's dependence on the US.

Soon after, Trump warned of crushing new tariffs if Europe enforced its laws against US tech firms on its own territory.

Europe's Claim vs. Reality

Over many years EU officials has asserted that its market of 450 million affluent people gives it unanswerable sway in trade negotiations. But in the six weeks since the US warning, the EU has taken minimal action. No retaliatory measure has been taken. No activation of the recently created trade defense tool, the often described “trade bazooka” that Brussels once vowed would be its primary protection against foreign pressure.

Instead, we have polite statements and a penalty on Google of less than 1% of its annual revenue for established market abuses, already proven in American legal proceedings, that allowed it to “abuse” its dominant position in Europe's advertising market.

American Strategy

The US, under the current administration, has signaled its goals: it does not aim to strengthen European democracy. It seeks to undermine it. A recent essay released on the US State Department platform, written in paranoid, inflammatory rhetoric reminiscent of Viktor Orbán's speeches, charged the EU of “systematic efforts against Western civilization itself”. It condemned alleged limitations on authoritarian parties across the EU, from the AfD in Germany to PiS in Poland.

Available Tools for Response

What is to be done? Europe's anti-coercion instrument functions through calculating the extent of the pressure and imposing retaliatory measures. If most European governments consent, the EU executive could kick US products out of Europe's market, or impose tariffs on them. It can strip their intellectual property rights, block their investments and require compensation as a requirement of readmittance to Europe's market.

The instrument is not merely financial response; it is a declaration of political will. It was designed to demonstrate that the EU would always resist foreign coercion. But now, when it is needed most, it lies unused. It is not the powerful weapon promised. It is a symbolic object.

Political Divisions

In the period leading to the transatlantic agreement, many European governments talked tough in public, but failed to push for the instrument to be used. Some nations, such as Ireland and Italy, openly advocated more conciliatory approach.

Compromise is the last thing that Europe needs. It must enforce its laws, even when they are challenging. In addition to the anti-coercion instrument, Europe should shut down social media “recommended”-style algorithms, that recommend content the user has not requested, on European soil until they are demonstrated to be secure for democratic societies.

Comprehensive Approach

Citizens – not the algorithms of foreign oligarchs serving external agendas – should have the freedom to decide for themselves about what they see and share online.

Trump is pressuring the EU to weaken its online regulations. But now especially important, Europe should hold large US tech firms responsible for anti-competitive market rigging, surveillance practices, and targeting minors. Brussels must hold certain member states accountable for not implementing EU digital rules on US firms.

Regulatory action is not enough, however. The EU must gradually substitute all foreign “major technology” services and cloud services over the coming years with homegrown alternatives.

The Danger of Inaction

The significant risk of the current situation is that if Europe does not take immediate action, it will never act again. The more delay occurs, the more profound the erosion of its confidence in itself. The increasing acceptance that opposition is pointless. The more it will accept that its laws are unenforceable, its institutions lacking autonomy, its democracy not self-determined.

When that occurs, the path to undemocratic rule becomes unavoidable, through automated influence on social media and the acceptance of misinformation. If Europe continues to cower, it will be drawn into that same decline. Europe must act now, not only to resist Trump, but to create space for itself to function as a independent and sovereign entity.

Global Implications

And in taking action, it must make a statement that the international community can see. In North America, South Korea and Japan, democracies are observing. They are wondering if the EU, the remaining stronghold of international cooperation, will stand against external influence or surrender to it.

They are inquiring whether representative governments can survive when the leading democratic nation in the world abandons them. They also see the example of Lula in Brazil, who confronted US pressure and showed that the approach to address a aggressor is to respond firmly.

But if Europe hesitates, if it continues to issue diplomatic communications, to levy symbolic penalties, to anticipate a improved situation, it will have effectively surrendered.